Live and Let Die
by Lady Fingers20
Summary: Bella is living a normal life with her parents when the unimaginable happens. She tries to move forward with a happy facade, but is there anyone who can see behind her mask before it's too late?
1. The Beginning

**All right! So here is my second attempt at a Twilight fan fic. I've got a number of chapters already written up, but I want to see how the response is before I release them all. **

**Disclaimer: I do not own The Host or any of its characters; they belong to the lovely Stephenie Meyer. I do however, own the plot.**

**Bella POV**

I was standing in a room full of people, yet I hardly knew anyone. They had all introduced themselves as various members of my family; but they were so foreign to me, they could have been strangers off the street for all I knew. I was constantly looking out for the one and only person on this whole planet that mattered the most to me, but he hadn't shown up yet, and I wasn't sure how much longer I could last without him.

I sat on the couch closest to the door in the stuffy room, ready to bolt at any second while the people in the room mingled and talked around me in hushed voices. I couldn't bring myself to look over at the other end of the room at what I knew had all their attention; I knew what it was, yet I couldn't bear to look, and until he got there, I knew that I couldn't look at all.

My good friend Angela, whose face seemed to be the only familiar one in the crowd, came over and sat down beside me, enveloping me in a soft hug. She wasn't one for unnecessary talking, which was what I liked about her the most. She recognized that sometimes there was a need for silence and that every second of our time together didn't have to be devoted to talking. She reached over and took my hand in hers, giving it a reassuring squeeze, asking a silent question. I gave her the smallest of smiles to assure her that I was doing okay to answer her. Angela knew that I was sick of being asked that question; I swore that if someone said that to me again I would scream.

She caught me looking over at the door again for about the millionth time that night and squeezed my hand again.

"He'll be here soon, you know. He wouldn't miss this for the world," she whispered to me softly.

"I know. I just wish he had arrived earlier; I feel so out of place here," I replied quietly.

"He would have been here that night, you know that. It's not his fault that the snowstorm kept his plane grounded. He'll be here," she assured me again.

I looked down at my hand that was resting in my lap on top of my black dress. It held a tissue inside of it that someone had pressed in my hand earlier, but I knew I would not need it. I was not one to show emotion, particularly to a room of strangers.

All I wanted at that moment was to be alone in a room by myself. I didn't want anyone probing me for answers or introducing themselves as another Great-Aunt that I had never met in my life. I needed one person right then, and his flight had been delayed yet again.

I checked my phone for the hundredth time that hour, but there were no new texts or voice mails except for the one he had sent me from the airport that to tell me he would be there in a few short hours. I checked the time; he was late. I felt almost sick to my stomach with worry about what could have possibly happened to him, and the thoughts running through my head were not exactly pretty.

Just then Angela's Dad came up to us and started speaking to me, but I just couldn't bring myself to pay any attention. I looked over at Angela and she seemed to understand the message that I was trying to convey and stood up to take her Dad aside to talk to him about the rest of this horrible event. I decided then that I needed some air; I couldn't stay in that stuffy room with all the flowers any more.

As I was walking towards the doors to outside I passed the front desk and all the people around it gave me sad and sympathetic smiles as they had been trained to do. I ignored them and continued my trek outside. I stood outside the building and wrapped my arms around myself as it was getting colder with the sun rapidly setting. The low sun reflected across the dreaded sign out on the front lawn of the building.

In those cheap plastic letters, it read, "_Mr. and Mrs. Charlie and Renee Swan."_

I tore my eyes away from it before they could travel lower to the name of the place, unwilling to admit that I was actually there at that moment. Instead, I became focussed on the crack in the sidewalk beneath my feet; it seemed to calm my nerves a little bit until he arrived. My head snapped up as I heard the sound of tires on the driveway and was extremely disappointed that it was only a hearse pulling into the parking lot. It came up the circular driveway and came to a stop in front of me, a second one following behind it. One of the drivers and the director of this event got out of the first one and walked up to me, and the latter began to speak.

"Everything for tomorrow is ready; these are the hearses that your mother and father will be travelling in to their plots. We will be ready for you to come in early tomorrow if you wish to see the closing of the caskets, then we will be heading over to the church and then the cemetery shortly after that."

I nodded and quietly thanked him. He could probably tell from the look on my face that I needed to be left alone and so the pair of them went into the building, leaving me alone outside. I took one look around and saw that no new cars were in the lot before crouching down and hugging my knees. Things would have been so much better if he were there to hold me and assure me that everything was going to be alright. I just needed him so bad and his stupid flight just kept getting delayed over and over again.

I put my head down on my knees and willed myself not to cry; at that moment I felt extremely vulnerable and alone. It was a huge world and there I was, sitting on the sidewalk outside of Jacksonville Memory Gardens Funeral Home by myself.

"Bella?"

I kept my head resting on my knees, sure that I was just imagining his deep rumbling voice. I convinced myself that I was hallucinating; if he were to arrive, I would have heard the car pull up. Instead, I let out a small, helpless sob.

"Oh, Bella!"

I heard footsteps running towards me and I looked up just in time to see his big frame swooping down upon me and his strong arms enveloping me in a hug. I turned in his arms and allowed him to fully embrace me. I wrapped my arms around his thick chest and rested my head against one of his shoulders and let him hold me. I almost felt whole sitting on the pavement with him holding me in his arms.

"Bella, oh Bella. I'm so sorry, honey. I'm just so sorry," he said to me, kissing my hair and holding me tighter against him.

"Emmett, you don't have anything to be sorry for, it was all my-" I started to whisper, but he interrupted.

"No," he said roughly. "Don't you dare try and blame yourself. We're not going to talk about this right now; we can talk later, but please, not right now," he pleaded with me.

I looked up into his brown eyes and saw the pain and hurt in them, nodding my head in compliance to his request. I would do anything to take away the pain in his eyes, and agreeing with him was the easiest way I knew how to.

Emmett loosened his hold on me to look at me fully. I knew I looked horrible. I hadn't gone out much in the days since it happened except to meet with the funeral director. I knew that I was an empty shell; my parents had meant the world to me and they had been ripped away like it was nothing. I looked up into Emmett's face and saw the grief written all across it and knew that he too was broken. He brushed the hair out of my face and kissed my cheek before closing his eyes, overcome with emotion.

I tried to remain strong for my big brother, but I couldn't hold it in any longer; I had been bottling up my pain and emotions and being with Emmett gave me the sense of security that I had been missing since it had happened. I allowed myself to completely break down; Emmett was the only thing I had left to live for, and my brother meant the world to me. I knew that he would not allow any harm to come to me, and I would do the same for him.

I broke down and started to cry in his arms, shaking with the effort it took not to fully release them.

"Bella," Emmett said, and I opened my eyes to look up at him and saw that he was looking down at me once again. "Bella, don't hold it in honey. You don't need to be strong for me, I am here for you. No harm will come to you; you don't need to hold back your tears."

I completely lost my composure after his little speech and broke down into violent sobs that shook my whole entire body. Emmett's arms tightened around me and I could feel his body shaking against mine also; he was crying with me. We probably looked like the most pathetic pair ever, huddled on the sidewalk sobbing in each other's arms, but I really didn't care at that moment. I had my big brother with me and I would allow him, and him alone to witness my grief.

After a few minutes, one of the funeral home operators came outside and cleared her throat. I looked up and recognized the artificial tan on her legs at once. Lauren cleared her throat again and both Emmett and I glared up at her.

"Yes?" Emmett asked with clenched teeth.

"I'm sorry to interrupt your little....gathering, but Mr. Weber is ready to commence," she said to us, coldly.

During the time I had spent at the Home, I tried to avoid Lauren at all costs as she was nothing but rude and cold towards me. I had no idea what exactly her problem was with me, but whenever we came in contact with each other, she made sure to belittle me and make me feel vulnerable under her gaze. I tried not to let it get to me though and be the better person, but it was very hard when she was constantly there and destroying any sort of self-esteem that I had.

"We'll be there in a second," Emmett replied.

"But he's ready right now," she started to protest but Emmett cut her off.

"I said we'll be there in a second. He can wait for us," Emmett repeated a little more harshly.

Lauren turned on her tall black heel and stalked back into the building, huffing on the way.

"What is her problem?" Emmett asked.

"I don't know. She's been rude to me a lot these last couple of days, and I don't know why," I whispered back.

Emmett glared after her before returning his gaze to my face. He sighed and brushed away the few tears that were still falling down my cheeks.

"Bella, you must think I'm a horrible brother; I should have been here days ago. You shouldn't have had to be alone and do all of this all by yourself."

"Emmett, it's alright. It's in the past. Besides, there's nothing you could have done about Mother Nature and her snow. You said it yourself; that snow this time of year was inevitable in Seattle," I replied, trying to get my strength back for him.

"I know, but all the same."

"Emmett, you got here in time; that is all that really matters now. Even if you couldn't make it to plan this, I'm glad that you got here in time for the actual event; there is no way that I would be able to do this without you, you're all I have left," my voice broke on the last few words and another sob escaped.

"Bella, I will always be here, you know that," I nodded and Emmett gave me one of his bone crushing hugs. "We should probably get back in there before that rat comes back out to get us."

I nodded and Emmett released everything but my hand and pulled me up to a standing position beside him. He wrapped his arm around my waist and I rested my head on his arm, as when I was standing up my head didn't reach his shoulder, and together we walked into the funeral home.

We walked into the parlour that our parents' coffins were in and the room fell into a hushed silence. Emmett led me to the front row of the chairs that had been set up for the small sermon and pulled two chairs close together so we could sit directly beside each other. Truthfully, I didn't want to leave him, but I also didn't want to look like a cling-on baby in front of our relatives, so I settle into my chair beside him. I still couldn't let him go altogether or I would fall apart and he seemed to realize this, so we held each other's hands; holding on for dear life. Mr. Weber looked over at us and Emmett nodded giving him the signal to start.

It was short and consisted of a few passages read from the Bible along with a small speech made by Mr. Weber about death and how it was inevitable. The service the next day would be longer and more in depth, but I had decided on a small sermon for that night as well.

When it ended, Emmett rose to his feet to shake hands with Mr. Weber to thank him and then our various family members descended upon him to offer their condolences. Emmett knew a lot more of those people than I did; he was four years older than I was and had experienced more family reunions than I had in our lives. We hadn't had one for awhile either because of some rift in our Mom's family, so they were that much more foreign to me. Angela came over and sat in the seat on my other side, giving me a small hug from my side. I hugged her back carefully.

"I know that you're hurting right now, Bella, but believe me, with Emmett here now it will only get better. It will hurt for a long time, but it will get better, I promise you."

I gave Angela a weak smile and returned her hug as gently as I could. Angela stayed with me until it was time for her and her father to go home, leaving me to go home with Emmett. She had been staying with me at my empty house since we had learned that Emmett's flights were delayed, as I couldn't bring myself to live in my house alone. There were too many memories that constantly bombarded me and I needed someone else there.

"I'll see you tomorrow, Bella," she said to me as she rose to her feet.

Instead of getting up myself, I looked up at her. "You're coming tomorrow?"

"Of course I am, Bella. I wouldn't miss this, I'll be there for you," she said before being swept from the room by her father.

Eventually the guests left one by one until it was just Emmett and I in the parlour alone with the two caskets. They were side by side, my mother on the left and my father on the right. I hadn't gone over to see them for myself; I couldn't bring myself to do it without Emmett with me.

Emmett came back over and kneeled in front of me where I was still sitting in my chair.

"Ready to go?"

"I guess," I replied, looking over at the caskets.

"Have you gone and seen them?" Emmett asked softly.

I shook my head.

"Neither have I. Will you come with me?"

Part of me wanted to shake my head 'no' and run screaming from the room, but I knew that it would accomplish nothing. Instead I bravely nodded my head and let Emmett take my hand again to pull me up from my chair as we slowly walked to the front of the room and to our mother's casket.

Emmett knelt down in front of it and gently tugged my hand for me to follow. We quickly prayed and then I slowly looked into the casket at my mother's body. She was wearing the light blue dress that I had picked out for her and she looked lovely. They had done her hair nicely and applied a little more make-up than she would have worn in her normal, everyday life, but it made her look incredible. I knew that the make-up was to help preserve her, and I was grateful for that; I wanted to remember her as the beautiful woman that she was, not some disintegrating corpse. My mother's arms were folded over her abdomen and it simply looked like she was sleeping. I tentatively reached in and touched her hand; it was as cold as ice, the blood would never pump through its veins again. Never again would her arms open for me; I would never feel her warm embrace, feel her tender kisses, hear her voice, and be witness to her life. She would never grow old, never attend my wedding or get to hold her grandchildren. I could feel that familiar lump in my throat and I choked back a sob.

"She looks lovely," Emmett whispered in my ear and I nodded. "We should go see Dad," he suggested.

We rose from Renee's casket and knelt down in front of Charlie's. We quickly said another prayer for him before I looked into his casket. He was wearing a light blue button up shirt that I had picked to match my mother's dress and a pair of grey slacks. My father was also sporting a little make-up and I smiled slightly at what his reaction would have been had he ever been forced to wear it in his life. My father's hands were folded also and I reached in to touch his hand. Like my mother's, it was ice cold and limp. This was not the Charlie that he had been a few days ago. That Charlie was living and breathing; he liked to tease me and ruffle up my hair just to get a reaction out of me. He would never do that again. I would never get to hear another teasing about how I never tanned, no matter how much time I spent out in the sun; that was his favourite topic. He would never get to fish again, and I knew that I would miss those occasional Sunday fishing trips with him. I did enjoy the time alone with him, even if I didn't tell him that as much as I should have.

Fighting back more tears, I rose and Emmett followed me. Together we walked from the room and Emmett talked to the director about tomorrow, I merely stood there empty, and let him take care of everything. Slowly we walked back outside and to my big lug of a truck.

"Emmett, how did you get here? You didn't drive, did you?"

He shook his head. "No, I was taking a cab over when it broke down about three blocks away from here. I walked the rest of the way instead of waiting for a replacement."

"That's silly," I said, climbing into the passenger seat, letting him drive. "You should have called me; I would have come and got you."

"I know. But it didn't kill me to walk, either."

I sighed as he turned the key and the engine roared to life. Carefully, he put my truck into drive and pulled out of the parking lot on to the main road. We rode in silence back to the house and I pressed my head against the cool glass, watching the world go by. It amazed me, I thought as we waited at a red light and a crowd of people passed in front of us, laughing and carrying on, that people could be so carefree and take their life for granted, when it could all be taken away from them in the blink of an eye.

I was so consumed with my thoughts that I didn't even notice that we were at the house until I heard Emmett calling my name.

"Bella are you okay? I called your name three times."

I nodded my head and pulled on the handle to open the door, hopping down onto the paved driveway. Emmett quickly ran over to me and stopped me before I could climb the stairs up to the porch, bag in his hand. I wondered where it had come from, but then I realized that he must have thrown it in there when he first got to the funeral home.

"You know that you can talk to me about anything, right? I don't want you to hold back anything from me, especially now, alright?"

I looked up into Emmett's eyes and nodded my head again before ducking around him and continuing up the stairs, stopping outside the door and waiting for him to open it as he was holding my keys. Emmett stood on the walkway for a few seconds, trying to really gauge my emotions. Once he had given up he climbed the stairs and unlocked the front door.

The lights were off as I had forgotten to turn them on before I had left that morning, not really thinking that far ahead. I quickly walked through the house and turned some on before collapsing into my chair at the kitchen table.

"Are you hungry Bells?" Emmett asked as he walked into the kitchen after me.

I knew that I hadn't really eaten anything as of late, but I wasn't hungry. I shook my head and Emmett frowned.

"Are you sure, Bella? You look like you haven't eaten in a while," he turned and opened up the fridge. "And there's nothing to eat in here."

"I'm fine, Emmett. I've been eating over at the Weber's lately, so I haven't been cooking," I explained, lying through my teeth.

I'm pretty sure that Emmett knew that I was lying because he was the one person in this whole world that knew me the best, but he didn't push it like I thought he would have.

"Well, do you want anything? I can go out and bring back something or run to the store quick," he offered.

"Honestly, Em I'm fine. I'm just tired so I'm going to shower and then go to bed, alright?"

He gave me a sad look before nodding. "I'll go and do some shopping soon though, okay?"

I nodded while getting up from the chair and headed out of the kitchen and up the stairs.

Our house certainly wasn't massive or anything, but it had suited the four of us. It was cozy and was everything that we had needed while growing up. My room was upstairs on the end of the hall beside the bathroom and Emmett's was just beside mine. The night that my parents had died, I had closed their door and couldn't bring myself to venture into the room, or even look at their door for that matter. That was extremely difficult, seeing as how their room was right at the top of the stairs. The last few nights I had been 'sleeping' on the pull out couch in the living room because I simply couldn't bring myself to walk past it ever day. Angela had even gone up to get clothes for me and I had showered at her house, so that was the first time that I had ventured up the stairs in awhile.

I quickly averted my eyes away from the door when I reached the top of the stairs and swiftly walked into the bathroom, throwing the door closed behind me. I was breathing heavily as I started running the water when my tears began to fall so I could muffle the sounds of my sobs. With the water running I took a good look at myself in the mirror for the first time in days.

My hair was only somewhat decent because Angela had played with it earlier that day, trying to make it not look so pitiful. My face was sallow looking now and my cheeks were somewhat sunken; probably from the lack of nutrition. What caught my eye were the dark circles under my eyes. They were red and puffy from my crying, but the circles were still very visible. I had not slept a wink since the accident. Every time I closed my eyes, even for a minute, visions of their deaths replayed behind my eyelids and I would end up screaming out.

I stepped into the shower and let the hot water run down my body, prickling the skin with its warm droplets. I closed my eyes and started to stop the tears that kept running down my face. I had to start to pull it together it not for myself, but for Emmett. I couldn't let him see just how hurt that I really was; I needed to be strong. Emmett didn't need to feel my pain on top of his. He had just arrived into the nightmare, so he was a little high-strung and not the easy going brother that I knew, and my emotions would just give him added stress. I didn't want to do that to him.

I got out of the shower and carelessly towel dried my hair, not really caring about my refection any more. There was no point. Neither Emmett or Angela cared what I looked like, and they were the only two that I had in my life any more. I dressed in my pyjamas, stepping out of the bathroom and walked directly into Emmett.

"Sorry," I mumbled as his hands steadied me.

Emmett smiled softly. "I see that your co-ordination problems haven't sorted themselves out then, have they?"

I shook my head and tried to continue on to my room, but he held me in place.

"I know that right this second isn't the time to do this, but at some point could you please tell me what happened? All I know about this is what I've managed to dig up on the internet and what the hospital told me when they called; which wasn't much."

I looked up at Emmett. He deserved to know, but I couldn't bring myself to tell him right then. I was still trying to get over it myself and wasn't sure if I was strong enough just yet.

"Later."

"That's all I ask."

Emmett hugged me tight before releasing me and I slowly walked to my room, closing the door behind me, but not locking it. When we were little, we only locked our doors if we were really mad at each other. It was a stupid thing that we still did to that day. I leaned back against the door and rested my head against it as I heard Emmett sigh before walking into his room. I heard his door close, but not lock.

"At least he's not mad at me," I mused, climbing into bed and pulling the covers up.

I didn't know how long that would last though; he would surely be livid with me once I finally told him what happened that night, and I suppose I deserved it. My rational side was clearly not thinking that night, for I kind of wanted him to be mad at me for what had happened; everyone up until that point had been sympathetic and caring, and a part of me just really needed someone to scream at me. I mentally berated myself for thinking such thoughts, but I knew deep down in my heart that it was true. My eyes began closing on their own accord, and I couldn't fight them anymore; I was exhausted both physically and emotionally and for the first time in days I fell right asleep.

**A/N: So? Good? Bad? Should we continue?  
Please please leave a review so that I can get your thoughts!!**

**Review! : )**


	2. The Other End

**Second Chapter! : )**

**Thanks so very much to littledhampir13, ASHLEYYYBLACKBERRYYY and hanaharoo for your wonderful reviews!**

**Disclaimer: I do not own Twilight or any of its characters; they belong to the lovely Stephenie Meyer. I do however, own the plot.**

**Emmett POV**

It killed me to see her like that.

When I walked up to the funeral home and saw her in a ball on the sidewalk, I lost it. You just never knew with her what exactly she was going to do in a situation that was emotionally charging, but I wasn't prepared for her to look so... so vulnerable when I first saw her. Bella normally tried to put on a strong, confidant facade, but clearly it had been broken down moments before I had arrived.

As I ran up to her, I cursed myself for not being able to get there to her sooner. I should have been there the night that it had happened; Bella should not have had to be alone for all this time. I had failed as a big brother because of that. I knew that Angela had been staying with her, and I thanked her profusely when I talked to her, but it should have been me by her side. I should have been there with her in the hospital; I should have been there to make all these arrangements. She should not have had to do it all alone, especially considering that she had seen and heard it all; having to deal with the aftermath was probably just the icing on the cake for her. It was no wonder that she was in such rough shape when I had first seen her.

I leaned back against the counter in the kitchen and held my head in my hands. I would never forget that night; no matter how long I lived to be:

I was in a club with my girlfriend and a few of our close friends, having a good time, drinking and partying like normal college people do on a Friday night in Seattle, and all over the States, for that matter. I remembered that my phone was going off while I was dancing with Rosalie, my girlfriend, but she had threatened me if I dared to pick it up. I obeyed and didn't give it a second thought letting the caller go to voicemail, instead wrapping my arms around her and bringing her closer to me. She looked so hot that night and I felt protective of her; all the guys in the club were looking at her like she was a piece of meat; and it didn't help that she knew it and was flaunting everything she had for them, teasing them.

I didn't answer my phone when it went off the second time, or the third, but the fourth time my ringtone started blaring, I reached down into my pocket to retrieve it. I quickly glanced down at the screen and I didn't recognize the number, but it had an area code from Jacksonville. I frowned and told Rose that I had to take the call, not looking up to see the expression on her face, but she had told me that it had better be a very important phone call, or else I would find myself a very lonely man that night; and I knew that she wasn't kidding. I never joked with Rosalie about our sex life; I valued it too much.

I had walked off into a deserted corner of the club where it was a little quieter before answering. I will never forget that phone call.

"_Mr. Swan?" an unfamiliar voice was on the other end._

"_Yes," I had answered, rolling my eyes. I had always hated how girly my last name sounded. I was a little intoxicated, and the thought of Swan and girly in the same sentence almost made me chuckle, but I somehow managed to compose myself._

"_My name is Catherine Winston and I'm calling from Saint Vincent's Medical Center in Jacksonville."_

_I clenched my teeth tight, grinding my molars together. If Bella had sprained her ankle again, or something else that was just as menial, I was going to kill her the next time I was home. Rosalie really meant what she had said, and I could see her glaring at me from where I stood._

_ "I am calling on behalf of Bella Swan, your sister."_

_ "Yes," I said to her impatiently, wanting to desperately get back to Rose, winking at her; to which she just rolled her eyes._

_ "There has been an accident..."_

_Those five words reverberated around in my slightly drunk head. There couldn't have been. Everyone was fine when I had talked to them the day before; Bella was telling me about something that happened at school in her gym class where she had yet again taken someone out with a badminton racket, and Mom was going on about some Yogalaties or whatever, and Dad was telling me about his upcoming fishing trip. My whole entire world crumbled with her next words._

"_Your parents, Mr and Mrs Charlie and Renee Swan have been in a serious accident. Charlie Swan was pronounced dead at the scene and we brought Renee in, but she had sustained serious injuries. The doctors did all that they could, but I'm sorry, Mr. Swan."_

_The phone literally fell out of my hands as my legs collapsed from underneath me. I found myself kneeling on the gross floor, all of a sudden sobered up as I quickly snatched my phone back up from where it had fallen beside me. I held onto it like it was my lifeline; I could feel my knuckles straining against the skin on top of it and I couldn't respond for a few moments. I just kept breathing heavily, trying to get myself under control before I spoke to the woman again._

"_Mr. Swan?" she called to me through the phone, but it was like her voice was a hundred miles away or something; it was hard for me to hear her. I felt almost numb and like I was all alone, if that were even possible, seeing as how I was still standing in a crowded night club._

"_Mr. Swan!" the voice said again and I snapped out of my little state, fear running through my veins._

"_Bella. Where is Bella?" I had asked, frantic with worry about her. She hadn't said anything about her and it was killing me._

"_Your sister is here with us for the time being until you arrive to pick her up, or we can send her with Children's Aid. We cannot let her leave the premises as she is under the legal age, sir."_

_I cursed internally. Even if I could catch a flight out, I wouldn't get there until the morning at the very earliest. I knew that I had to think rationally about this, because I couldn't let her get taken away. It was such crap that this had happened and there was no way for me to get her in the next few hours. I took some comfort in the knowledge that she was okay, at least._

"_Can I have someone else get her?" I asked, running a hand through my hair and looking back at Rosalie, seeing that she was now grinding up against our other friend Alice, glaring over at me. She was pissed that I was basically ignoring her but this was incredibly important._

"_What is their relation to the family?" the caller asked; I couldn't remember her name though because I didn't seem to be processing much of anything that didn't relate to Bella, Mom or Dad._

"_Bella's... Bella's best friend," I managed to get out, and I couldn't remember her name either for the life of me. Rose was still glaring at me and I turned away from her a little bit so that I could concentrate some more._

"_I'm sorry, but-"_

"_Please!" I called out. "Please! I'm in Seattle and I won't be able to get there until the morning. I can't have her stay in the hospital all night, and I certainly can't have Children's Aid scooping her up either." _

_I felt a hand on my shoulder and looked down to see Jasper frowning up at me. Once he caught my eye he nodded towards the show Rose and Alice were putting on, but I shook my head at him and his frown deepened. _

"_Please! Nothing will happen, the guy's a priest!" I pleaded, and felt Jasper's hand tighten on my shoulder; I knew that he would be concerned and confused as well, he had a scary way of knowing what people's emotions were and I was probably affecting him._

"_Mr. Swan, I'm going to ask you to calm down. You need to come and collect her yourself," she instructed and I groaned._

"_I won't be able to get there until the morning," I repeated. Was this bitch really that dense? I also couldn't believe that I had resorted to begging in order to get through to this girl. It probably wasn't in their policies or whatever, but really? Most people had hears and could understand in a situation like that._

_There was a brief pause before she spoke again. "What is the name?"_

_I wanted to jump for joy at the fact that she was considering my option, but then I couldn't think of the name again. "Uhh... Weber? Yes, Weber. Angela is the girl's name and the Dad works at the church down on...."_

_ "Reverend Weber?"_

_ "Yes, that's him." Hallelujah that she even knew who he was; Jacksonville had its fair share of churches._

_ "I will contact him to come and get Bella, if that is what you would prefer." I could hear the distinct sound of clicking on her end of the phone, which was like a miracle that I could make that out over the loud noise from the speaker and my slightly tipsy state._

_I nodded stupidly; for she couldn't see me over the phone. "Yes, it is." _

_I rose to my feet and felt Jasper's hand fall off my shoulder before I marched over to the girls, took a hold of Rosalie's hand and dragged her over to the booth that we had, throwing her coat at her before trying to put mine on, all while still holding the phone to my ear. She glared at me and put her hands on her hips. I knew that Jasper would be right behind me wanting to know what was up, but I didn't care; I needed to get out of there right that second._

_ "You had better tell me what is going on, Emmett Swan," Rose practically growled but I held up one finger to her and she looked positively livid, but proceeded to put on her coat all the same. I saw our other friends descend upon her, clearly looking for answers that she couldn't give. I turned away from them and back to my phone call, switching hands so that I could put my arm through the other sleeve._

_ "What exactly happened, miss..." I had forgotten her name too. Technically it wasn't my fault; I was blaming it on the alcohol._

_ "It's Catherine, and I am not allowed to give out any details about the accident, as per hospital protocols," she answered and I groaned, zipping up my zipper at the same time._

_ "Please, Catherine. I am thousands of miles away from my family and my little sister is stranded there. Can you not give me any information?" I tried to plead, but this chick obviously had a stick up her ass and wasn't going to bend the rules for me. Well, much more than she already had._

_ "No. I shall contact Reverend Weber, but if I don't get a hold of him, Bella will be leaving with Children's Aid," she replied and I sighed at the fact that she was at least doing that for me._

_I nodded stupidly again at her and began to weave my way through the crowd to walk out of the club, pausing only once to see if Rosalie was behind me. She was, hands on her hips and stomping her way across the floor._

_ "I understand. Please let me know who she ends up leaving with," I basically instructed Catherine as I pushed open the doors of the club and stepped into the cold air._

_ "I will Mr. Swan. You have a pleasant evening."_

I snorted as I hung up the phone and turned to face Rosalie and my friends who were all standing silently on the sidewalk. The night was anything but pleasant now. It had started out all right, but one simple phone call essentially changed the course of my entire life; I had no idea what to do about it now and I ran my hands through my hair, phone in hand as I looked at each of my friends.

I could see all of their breaths in the frigid air, and could tell by the way that they were standing that they were either really pissed off or really confused, which they totally had the right to be. Jasper still looked a bit confused and pained, probably because out of the group I was the one who had the least amount of troubles; that shit was usually left up to the others. Alice and Rosalie just looked downright pissed and I was sure that Rose was ready to rip me a new one for not explaining anything to them yet. I wasn't looking forward to that. And Edward was kind of standing off to the side as usual, hands shoved in his pockets and I could see he was biting on the inside of his cheek.

"Well?" Alice demanded from Jasper's arms where he was holding her to keep her warm. That little pixie could hardly generate enough heat for herself she was so small, so she was always complaining of the cold. I was pretty sure that she wasn't even thinking of that though, judging by the look on her face and her stance.

"Yes, Emmett. Please tell me why it was so important to drag us out of the club without a word," Rosalie spoke to me and I already knew that she was mad from back when I walked away to take the call, but her tone solidified my knowledge of that. She and Alice had been planning that night for about a month and it was ruined all thanks to me.

"Look, I'm sorry Alice and Rose. I know how long you guys have been planning this. You can go back inside if you'd like, but I have to catch a plane now," I said, looking them all in the eye. Rosalie frowned and I saw her anger flare again, but luckily Jasper saved me from her wrath.

"Why?" Jasper asked. He hardly ever spoke and was the quietest one of the group, but when he did it was always important; like how he was saving my ass right then.

"That was Saint Vincent's Hospital in Jacksonville," I said to them, pointing to my phone.

"Did Bella fall again?" Alice asked. They had never met before, but all my friends knew a lot about Bella and her co-ordination problems from what I had told them.

"No, it wasn't her this time. It was... there was an..." I sighed, might as well get this over with and tell them; no sense keeping it all to myself and giving Rosalie more ammunition to kill me with. "My parents were in an accident. I don't know what happened, the girl on the phone wouldn't tell me, but all I know is that they both died."

My words hung in the cold air as everyone processed them. I could see four faces with various forms of shock written all over them and our breaths puffed in front of us while everyone paused for a second. I looked away up the street and then back at them and their expressions hadn't changed much. Rosalie was the first one to get a hold of herself and she ran forwards to wrap her arms around me. I certainly wasn't expecting that and had to brace myself so that we wouldn't fall over.

"I'm sorry, Emmett. I didn't mean to get mad at you like that," she apologized, pressing her lips into the side of my neck and I sighed, running my hand through her long blonde hair while holding her tight to me. I really needed her right then and she knew it. Rosalie could be self-centered and full of herself at times, but she knew when to rein it in and focus on someone else. Overall, inside her tough exterior she really was a wonderful person.

"I know, Rose. It's okay," I whispered, not really believing my own words. It wasn't okay, but I felt the need to comfort her now as well.

I felt two more sets of arms around me; one set around my waist from the pixie, and a single arm draped across my shoulders. I looked up from where my head was buried in Rosalie's hair to see Edward with his one arm around me. I gave him a small smile, which he returned with a nod. He still looked a little shell shocked and I noticed him run a hand through his hair, which usually meant that he was either nervous or uncomfortable. He wasn't one for affection at all, particularly in public, but it still helped to see that he was there making an effort for me.

After that I had driven straight to the airport with Rosalie; she claimed that she couldn't come with me to Jacksonville, but she was going to stay until my flight left. Alice and Jasper came over with my luggage shortly after as they had gone to my place to pack a bag when I went to get a ticket; she drove like a manic and it only got worse when she was in a hurry. They didn't stay long, for they both had early classes the next morning.

Edward had barely said more than three words to me since that night. I knew that it was probably stirring up some emotions from his past so I didn't push it either; I was more focussed on getting back to Bella as soon as humanly possible.

I had gotten a call back from Catherine at the hospital too, just to say that Reverend Weber had collected Bella and I breathed a huge sigh of relief. It would have been a huge pain in the ass to have to go bail her out of their hands as well.

I managed to book a flight that was to leave the next morning, but morning came and so did a mountain of snow. Growing up in Jacksonville we never had snow, and I loved seeing it here in Seattle, but that day I was cursing the Gods above for it. As a result, my flight was cancelled and I was bumped to another one for later that day.

The world seemed to have been against me as the snow kept falling and that flight was also cancelled. I spoke to Bella a few times and tried to explain, but it killed me to be sitting in an airport while she was alone at home. Technically Angela was still with her, but I felt bad all the same; it should have been me with her.

She kept trying to reassure me that everything was all right on her end, but I knew better; even talking to her over the phone I could tell that she was only a shell of what she usually was. Her voice which was usually full of life was so cold and dead, something that alerted me to her grief even with all her insisting that she was okay. I also felt guilty for leaving her to arrange the funerals, though she called me a lot to confirm things.

I finally managed to get a flight out the next night. Rose walked me to the gate and made me swear to call her once I got landed. She kissed me goodbye and I boarded the plane; it was like the longest flight of my life. We had a little bit of a delay due to the backlog of planes taking off in Seattle after the storm, but we finally got in the air and a half a lifetime later we landed.

I quickly scooped up my luggage from the claim and hailed a taxi outside to take me straight to the funeral home. I knew that I was late, and cursed when I saw the time; I didn't want to miss the little ceremony they were doing and wanted to be there for Bella. Then the stupid taxi broke down, and they offered to send out a replacement but I refused. It was only three blocks away and I didn't have time to sit and wait. I needed to get to Bella right then. I knew that she would have her beast of a truck to get us home in anyways; I just needed to see her for myself.

She had been trying to act calm whenever I had talked to her in the airport about funeral arrangements, but I knew that deep down she was hurting; I had to help her. It killed me to see her so broken out front of the building, sobbing to herself like that when I had walked up to her. I knew then that I had to do everything in my power to make it okay for her. Someone Bella's age should not have had to go through something as tragic of this alone.

After I thought of all this, the first thing that I did was call Rosalie again. I had already called her when I had gotten off the plane, but promised to call her once we were back at home, no matter what time it was. I knew Bella would be awhile in the shower still, and I still needed to talk to her too.

I pushed off the counter and grabbed the wall phone by the fridge, quickly dialling Rose's cell phone. I sat down in one of the mismatched kitchen chairs as I was sure that she would make this a long phone call. To my surprise, Rose picked up on the first ring, not even letting it finish.

"Emmett? How are you? Is everything okay?" she asked frantically and it sounded as if she was in a crowded space, but I decided not to question her about it.

"Yeah, Rose; it's alright for the time being. I got to the funeral home just in time by the looks of things. They did a little ceremony thing and then we came back here."

She caught my double meaning of 'just in time.'

"Is Bella okay?" Rosalie asked quietly and I noticed that the background noise on her end had diminished a lot.

I sighed and ran a hand through my hair, leaning forward to place my elbows on my knees.

"I really don't know, Rose. And I don't know what to do about it. I got there and she was in a ball on the sidewalk sobbing her heart out. I feel like such a failure."

"Emmett Swan, you are not a failure," she said fiercely and I smirked, looking at the tiles beneath my chair.

"Thanks, Rose, but it's true; there's no denying it. A real brother would have been able to be here the next morning for her. I can't even begin to think about what it's been like for her to be virtually alone in the world for the last few days."

Silence ensued on the other end, only broken by what sounded like running water in the background.

"Rose?" I asked, looking to the side and out the window into the darkened backyard.

"Yeah, I'm here. I... I'm just. Is she there?"

"She's in the shower and then I bet she'll go straight to bed," I told her, running a hand through my hair again and looking at the clock on the microwave. It was early, but Bella probably hadn't slept much and I figured that she would just call it a night rather than do anything else.

"How does she look?"

I sighed again, biting my lower lip while I tried to come up with the words to describe Bella's state.

"Horrible, Rose. She has these huge bags under her eyes that look like they'll never go away. I know that she hasn't been eating, because the fridge is full of spoiled food. She tried to convince me that she's been eating over at her friend's house, but she's a horrible liar. I don't know what to do. She blames herself, I know it," I felt beaten down and horrible, not being able to even force her to eat, but I knew that Bella would just fight it even more if I tried. I would try though, later after I went grocery shopping.

I could hear something coming from Rosalie's end and I frowned.

"Are you okay? Are you... crying?" I asked and heard her sniffle.

"I'm sorry, Emmett. I just wish that I was there for you two. I know that I've never really met her; she was away when I came to visit, but I feel like I should be doing something, not just sitting here."

"It's fine, Rosalie. You're doing a lot for me just by talking. Bella won't even do that."

"Has she told you what happened?"

I shook my head before rolling my eyes at myself. I had to break the habit of nodding in response to people's questions on the phone; no matter how many times I did it they still couldn't see me.

"No. I want to talk to her about it after she gets out of the shower."

"Emmett Swan, don't you dare! That poor girl is going through enough right now; she doesn't need you pestering her for information!" she practically shrieked into my ear and I groaned, standing up from the chair, turning around and leaning my elbows on the counter top.

"So then what am I supposed to do? I have a right to know, and she's the only one that can tell me."

"Give her an option. Tell her that you would like to know, but you realize that she's not exactly fit to tell you at this second. Ask her to tell you when she's ready, but please, whatever you do, don't push her."

"So what am I supposed to tell her?" I asked again. I hated feeling so useless, as it was not exactly something that I was used to in my life.

"Emmett, you're an intelligent man, make something up."

"If you're sure, Rose."

"I'm sure."

I heard the water switch off from Bella's shower above me and I took a deep breath.

"I've got to go, she's getting out now."

"Don't do anything stupid. Don't do anything to push her away from you. She needs you; don't alienate her, whatever you do. If she ever needs someone to talk to, tell her not to hesitate to call me. I want to help you guys as best as I can."

"Sure thing Rose."

"Call me tomorrow after the service. I'll have my cell on and charged all day."

"All right," I agreed, straining my ears for any sign of the bathroom door opening.

"Please don't blame yourself for what happened to her, Emmett. Give her time and she'll open up to you," Rosalie sounded a little sad and I knew that she hated that I blamed myself, but I couldn't help it.

"I know."

"I'll talk to you later then."

"Yeah, talk to you soon."

"I love you, Emmett."

"Love you too, Rosie baby."

I hung up and placed the phone back in its cradle before slowly trekking up the stairs.

I noticed that she had closed the door to our parents' room and I couldn't say that I blamed her. I may have been four years older, but even I couldn't bring myself to look in there with them gone. To my immense relief the door was still closed, which meant that Bella hadn't gone into her room just yet. I stood outside the bathroom door, leaving enough distance to make it seem like I was just passing by; not creepily waiting for her to emerge so that we could hopefully talk.

Eventually the door opened and she walked out, smacking right into me.

"Sorry," she mumbled as my hands shot out to steady her.

I couldn't help but smile. "I see that your co-ordination problems haven't sorted themselves out then, have they?"

Bella shook her head solemnly and tried to continue on to her room, but I stopped her. I needed to talk to her right then.

"I know that right this second isn't the time to do this, but at some point could you please tell me what happened? All I know about this is what I've managed to dig up on the internet and what the hospital told me when they called; which wasn't much."

I waited, practically holding my breath while she thought of a response. She couldn't deny me this information; I legally had a right to know.

"Later," she finally responded

"That's all I ask."

I gave her one last hug and watched as she walked slowly to her room and closed the door. I noted that she didn't lock it, meaning that she wasn't mad at me; breathing a sigh of relief, at least she wasn't mad at me for being late to this; for not acting like the brother I should have been. I closed my door and didn't lock it either. I needed her to know that I wasn't mad at her and that she could come to me at any time if she wanted to talk.

I quickly changed into some old pyjama bottoms that were in my drawer, too lazy to go back down the stairs to get my bag, and climbed into my bed, pulling the covers up high. I lay there for awhile just thinking about everything. I wondered if our lives would ever go back to normal. Bella was so close to Dad, and I was close to Mom that I knew living without them would be hard on both of us. I realized that in the course of one night, I had become Bella's guardian and I was now responsible for her life as well as mine.

Sure, we had relatives and stuff, but I truthfully didn't trust them with my sister. We weren't really close to them at all, only really saw them at weddings and stuff and I'd rather sacrifice something from my own life than give her up. It was clear that we needed each other to get through everything and I intended to keep her by my side as much as I could.

As I lay there looking up at the pop corned ceiling, I thought about how much Bella and I had changed in a short period of time. It felt to me like I would never smile again, or have a real reason to be happy; which I knew was totally bogus, but it still felt that way. Bella was completely destroyed by the looks of things. Outside of Mom, Dad and me, she only had Angela as a friend. I didn't know exactly why, but she didn't want to really be around other people. It wasn't for lack of being anti-social, the pair of them went to parties and stuff, it was just a quirk about Bella.

Eventually I tired myself out, and I was pretty sure that lying on an actual bed for the first time in days had something to do with it. One second I was awake and fully conscious and the next I was completely dead to the world.

**What did you think?  
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	3. How It All Happened

**Sorry for the delay! It seemed like every time I went to clean this chapter up I ended up doing something else instead!**

**Thanks to hanaharoo and ASHLEYYYBLACKBERRYYY for your reviews!**

**Disclaimer: I do not own Twilight or any of its characters; they belong to the lovely Stephenie Meyer. I do however, own the plot.**

**Emmett POV**

_Rose and I were back in the club we were in when I had gotten that phone call. She was dressed in her little pink sparkly dress and her killer black heels that I loved so much. She claimed that the heels were from some fancy designer and cost her a lot and didn't like when I made her keep them on for longer than necessary in fear of breaking them; but the sight of her in nothing but those heels was sexy as hell. Her hair was done in loose waves that cascaded down her back, the tips just touching the top of her ass, it and it smelled just like her floral shampoo. _

_ I wrapped my buff, muscular arms around her tiny, perfect waist and pulled her close to me. I could feel the stares of almost every guy in the room on her and I was feeling very possessive. Rose liked to flaunt everything to the random guys to try and make me jealous; and it worked the majority of the time. I was a very possessive person, so seeing her all flirty like that made me want to show her who she belonged to and she loved that. I didn't look up at the people who were surely watching her, guys and girls alike, but instead I kept my eyes on Rosalie, pulling her closer to my body._

_ Rosalie picked her head up and grinned before sliding her hands down my chest as she descended to the floor, ending in a crouch. Slowly, she worked her way back up, making sure to stick her ass out for good measure, just to taunt me further and get me more riled up, which worked really well. As soon as she was level with me, I let my hands glide down from her waist and let them rest on her ass, which was essentially just another caveman move on my part to show that she was taken._

_I smirked when I looked around and noticed that everyone was looking in our direction, so I decided to pull one last move before we left to continue the night by ourselves. I pulled Rose in close to me and was leaning down towards her, about to capture her beautiful, pouty lips in mine when she opened her mouth up too wide for the reason I had intended them being open for and she began to scream. _

My eyes flew open and I sat up in bed, my heart racing in my chest from being woken up like that. Why the hell was Rosalie screaming? She never screamed when I was simply trying to kiss her; it was usually when we were up to more intimate practises than simple kisses when her voice got higher like that. Or when she was mad at me, as I'd been on the receiving end of her wrath too many times for me to even begin to keep track of.

I sighed and looked over at the clock on my bedside table: 2:30am. Fantastic. I groaned and leaned forward, holding my head in my hands and closed my eyes again, but all that I could picture was the image of Rosalie beginning to scream again and I opened them up quickly before she let out that piercing scream once more. I could tell that it was going to be a very long night ahead of me and I was not very thrilled about that at all.

I remembered something then that my Mom used to tell me to do when I was younger and had bad dreams; back when I'd scream so loudly that it would wake her up and she'd come into my room to comfort me. She had always told me to roll onto my other side to reverse the dreams, and then they would be all better again. I decided to take her advice then and lay back down on my right side, away from the pesky numbers of my alarm clock so that they didn't keep me awake with their brightness. I chuckled to myself after that while yawning, thinking of Bella and how she always had to cover up her alarm clock so that she could sleep in total darkness; she used an old shirt or something equally as dark so it was almost like a cave in her room. It was also kind of ironic, because everyone always called me the bear, but she was the one who slept like that. My eyes must have drooped closed while I was thinking to myself, and I probably drifted into a light slumber in that position as all of a sudden I was startled awake by a blood-curdling scream.

"Bella," I said to myself, still groggy but my mind was able to decipher that it was her screaming out and not the Rosalie from my dreams.

I listened for half a second before she screamed out again and I threw off my covers, stumbling half blinded by sleep towards my door. I ripped it open and recoiled as the light from the hallway hit my sensitive eyes and it took me more than a second to even think about going out into the brightness that my eyes hadn't even attempted adjusting to. When Bella screamed out again that made up my mind for me; I threw my hand up in front of my eyes to shield them and barrelled towards Bella's door as fast as I possibly could have, given my drowsy state.

I grasped the handle and threw it open, looking around inside for any sign of what was going on while my eyes adjusted to the dark room again. The little light that filtered in from behind me gave me a chance to see that Bella was lying on her bed all tangled up in her sheets and rolling around fitfully.

"Please! God, no!" Bella yelled out and I rushed to her side, kneeling down on the area tug that she must have laid down recently, for I had never seen it before in my life. It was nice though; nicer than kneeling directly on the wood floor as that was a pain in the ass—or at least my knees.

She used to talk in her sleep, but I hadn't heard her do it in awhile; mind you, I hadn't actually been at home at the same time as her for a very long time. I had taken to staying in Seattle for many summers, opting to do co-op placements up there and stuff, I'd seen her a fair amount, but not as much as we'd originally thought that we would have. I supposed she was having a nightmare by the way that she was screaming and thrashing, so I placed a hand on her arm in a poor attempt to calm her down, but she rolled away from me at once.

"Please! I need them to live! I need my Mom and Dad! Don't take them from me!" Bella's face scrunched up in such a way that it looked like she was trying to wake up, but couldn't break through enough to.

I could feel my heart stop beating in my chest as she screamed out those words; she was dreaming about the night our parents died, I was sure of it and I didn't know what to do. Frozen to the spot, I looked down at my little sister helplessly as I watched her get tangled up in the sheets while she tried to get away from the images that were in her mind.

As she screamed out again, I snapped out of the little funk that I was in and I instantly knew that I had to wake her up, but I just didn't know how to go about doing that. A large part of me wanted to run and call Rose for advice; surely she would know what to do, but then again I didn't want to seem like a giant pussy. Rosalie had once told me that she used to wake Jasper up from his frequent night terrors when they were younger, because their parents weren't the best caregivers to them and when she had told me their story I was instantly angry that she essentially had to stand up as the mother to Jasper, even though they were the same age.

I remembered back to the time when Bella used to have the night terrors and I remembered that they were scarier than her actual nightmares, as it was so much harder to wake her up from them. Being four years older than her, I had understood what was going on with her and tried to reprise my role as the protective older brother when I tried to help my parents wake Bella up from her episodes; the thing that stuck with me way always the look on her face and it haunted me to that very day. She always looked so lifeless and almost possessed and I hated knowing that I couldn't stop her own mind from attacking her like that.

I realized though that I had to help her with her nightmares right then as I was Bella's only family; Mom and Dad weren't there to wake her up again, so I had to fix this somehow on my own. I sighed with the realization that it wasn't her freaky night terrors, so at least that would make it somewhat easier to break her out of them.

"Bella," I whispered, reaching for her hand, finally grasping with one of mine, but Bella still didn't seem to hear me.

"I want to see my Mother!" she screamed instead.

"I'm sorry, but she's not here. I need you to wake up, it's just a nightmare," I was basically making it up off of the top of my head; bullshitting it, if you will, but I really had no other ideas about what to do.

"Daddy? Where are you? I need you!"

She was breaking my heart into a million little pieces; what I wouldn't give to have him here to help me out, but I was all alone with this one. Bella rolled back over to me and I could see that she was sweating a lot, but there was no way that I could leave her side to go and get a cloth to cool her down. I managed to let go of her hand in order to reach out and hold onto her shoulder, while pushing the matted hair off her forehead. It felt kind of weird handling her in such a gentle manner, I wasn't really used to it, but I had a feeling that I needed to in the near future.

"Dad?" she asked feebly, her eyes still shut tightly.

"No Bella, it's Emmett. You remember me?"I asked, hesitating a bit and after awhile she nodded.

"I need you to wake up for me. You're having a nightmare, that's all it is. Just wake up Bella," I tried to coax her awake, not sure how exactly to attack this situation.

I could see her eyes fluttering around under their lids trying to open and I thought that maybe I wasn't so bad at what I was doing after all. Or at least I'd faked it enough to get through this round of it.

"Where's Mom?" Bella asked, still half asleep, her voice groggy.

Crap, I thought. How was I supposed to deal with that question?

"She's... a... she's sleeping, I didn't want you to wake her up, so I came instead," I bullshitted, hoping that it would work, at least until she woke up and realized what exactly was going on.

Bella nodded sleepily and finally opened her eyes, sitting up until her head was propped up on the headboard behind her, but at least she was looking at me. Emmett: 1, nightmare: 0.

"Oh God," she whispered before burying her head in her hands.

"Bella?" I asked cautiously, letting go of my hold on her and retracting my arm, but she didn't answer me and started to moan into her hands, which alarmed me a little bit.

I reached my arm out to her, but stopped as soon as I caught sight of her shaking body; she was crying and I had to do something for her, anything. In a swift movement, I climbed up onto Bella's bed and leaned my back against her head board. Very gently I touched her trembling shoulders and guided her back to my chest so that I could comfort her. She didn't fight against me and Bella's head ended up resting in the crook of my shoulder as I wrapped my arms securely around her, giving her head a fast kiss.

Most brothers wouldn't be quick to climb into their sister's beds and cuddle them like I was doing to Bella, but we had always had a special bond; something to do with me being four years older than her, Mom had always said. The fact of the matter was that even though I teased her relentlessly when we were growing up, I still loved her all the same, no matter what I did to her. I realized then that our bond was really something special, especially since I had to care for her now after we had both essentially been orphaned, though technically I was an adult, it the term still applied to me. I shuddered to myself at the word, not liking how it sounded when it pertained to us, and instead turned my attention back to Bella.

It killed me to see Bella all defeated like she was, but there was no was that I could break my calm resolve and let her see just how it affected me, no matter what. I needed to be her rock, the one thing in this world that she could lean on, as besides Angela, so really had no one with her anymore. I was, after all, her big brother, her protector of sorts, and nothing would ever harm Bella as far as I was concerned.

I just held her close while Bella continued to cry into my shirt, effectively soaking it right through, but I couldn't bring myself to say anything to her; I knew that until she was calm it would be just empty words to her. Eventually Bella's sobs quieted until just the sounds of our breathing were audible in the otherwise silent house.

"Bella?" I whispered to her after a few moments of peace between us, not wanting to upset her again, but I just had to know what it was all about.

"Mhm?" she answered gently and I was glad that she was at least up to responding that much.

"You don't have to... but do you mind telling me what you were dreaming of? I want to help you," I certainly didn't want to push her farther than she was willing to go, but knowing at least a little bit would be a good start to give me an idea of where to go from there.

She sighed and snuggled into my side a little further. "It was...that night."

Subconsciously, I tightened my arms around Bella and felt her rest her small arms stiffen around my stomach, but I was willing to wait until she was absolutely ready to tell me anything.

"I suppose I should tell him," she mused to herself, but I caught what she was saying and I was instantly nervous about what I was hopefully going to hear. Bella took a deep, shaky breath before speaking.

"They had come to watch my soccer game that night. We won, I scored five goals."

I couldn't help but smile a little, despite the circumstances that we were in. Bella was very clumsy and uncoordinated when it came to almost everything in life; with the exception of soccer. She excelled at the sport and she was the top scorer on their team.

"I had to be there early, so Mom let me take her car after a little, well, a lot of persuasion from me. She and Dad were going to come later on in the cruiser closer to game time because Dad was home a little later from work. Mom wasn't totally convinced that I was ready to drive such a long way by myself, but Dad had her sit down in their room and he and ended up convincing her that I would be fine to get their on my own,

"After the game, to appease Mom's impending hysteria over me driving alone after dark, Dad said that I had to drive behind them the whole way home. I know that she spent the whole ride looking in the mirror back at me just to make sure I was still there," she said sadly.

_'That sounds so like Mom,'_ I thought to myself. She nearly had a heart attack when I first drove by myself, and that wasn't even Bella's first time driving, whether it be alone or with someone else. I had been in the car with Bella with her driving and she was very respectful of the laws, Charlie's warnings had rubbed off on her over the years. I also assumed that watching me learn to drive probably had some sort of effect on her too, because I didn't really abide by many laws whenever Dad wasn't in the car with me.

"Anyways, we were going through an intersection on our way to hop on the interstate to get back home when a flock of stupid pelicans decided to land in the middle of the road at 9:45 at night."

I bit my bottom lip hard to hold in another smile when she told me that. Bella had never liked pelicans ever since she was three when we were at the beach and one of them took off with the head of her Barbie in its mouth. She had ended up chasing it for five miles down the beach before we eventually caught up with her and had to leave the beach and go to Toys R Us to buy her a new one.

"Let me guess, they landed in front of Mom and Dad, right?" I asked and she nodded into my side.

"We had the green light, but Dad slammed on the brakes halfway through the intersection. Then... that's when..." Bella broke down and dissolved into tears then and all I could do was hold her until she had finished.

"They didn't see it coming, they couldn't have," she whispered hoarsely. "I saw the whole thing. I was dead stopped about to enter the intersection and I saw it out of the corner of my eye. A big 18wheeler Mack truck was hurdling in their direction, and there was nothing that I could have done. The truck hit Dad's side first and they told me that he was killed upon impact. They were pushed about 200 yards down the road before finally coming to a stop. As they were coming to a halt, Dad's cruiser flipped onto its side, trapping Mom inside of it."

"Before they had even come to a stop, I had thrown my car in to park and leapt out leaving it parked in the middle of the road, running after them. I could hear cars honking at me in the background probably pissed that I had just leapt out but I didn't get why because there were others running over too; all that I could mostly hear were my own screams though. You have no idea, Emmett, no idea. I sat there and watched that friggen Wal-Mart truck hit Dad right on. I watched as he was flung to the side. I watched his lifeless body hit the seat and go limp."

"Once I reached them, I ran to the cruiser only to find Dad with no vital signs and Mom's bloody face pressed up against the passenger window. I couldn't do anything except kneel beside the cruiser while someone called 911 for me because there was no way that I could have pulled myself together enough to do that. Soon after the crash, the ambulance, police and fire department arrived and got them out right away. I was taken to the hospital in the back of a cruiser, but I was just so distraught that I didn't willingly go with them. When we got to the hospital and everything, they almost had to admit me too, because I was panicking so badly, Emmett. I can't believe that I lost it so badly, and that makes me ashamed of myself," she told me, and I wanted so badly to interrupt her, but I could tell that she wasn't finished with the story just yet.

"You know what the worst part is?" Bella asked gently and I shook my head, holding her tighter to me.

"It was my fault," she whispered softly.

"No, no Bella it..." I started to argue with her but she interrupted me.

"It was, Emmett. I had put up a fuss about driving the cruiser because I didn't want to, so I took Mom's truck. If I had let them take it and had sucked it up, then there would be a chance that they could have survived. I wish it was me up ahead in the cruiser. I wish..."

"Don't you dare finish that sentence, Isabella Marie Swan," I demanded, clapping my hand down on top of her lips. I knew exactly what she was going to say and I so didn't want her to finish off that thought at all.

"I do not want you to blame yourself for what happened. In no way possible was it your fault. This was fate," I told her, feeling angry that I knew she was going to try and blame herself for it after everything. That was just how she thought and it was the one thing that I didn't like about her; well, one of them, not that there were many.

She sighed so I lifted my hand from her face and she started speaking almost right away. "But it was..."

"Stop it. I don't want to hear it," I interrupted Bella right away before she could continue. "Yes, this is a horrible tragedy, but at least we have each other. Think of what it would have done to me if you were in that car too."

She was dead silent once I said that to her and I sighed heavily. It was the truth, and it might have been a bit harsh telling her that, but I needed to let it sink in before continuing to talk to her.

"Bella, the only way to work through this is to help each other. Right now you're not helping anything because you're blaming yourself. You can't do that, Bells. This was not your fault and no matter what you tell yourself, there is no way for you to have made it better. What's done is done."

I could tell that she started to cry again by the way that her body was shaking and I could also feel a few tears slipping down my cheeks as well, as I couldn't seem to control them since I had returned to Bella again.

Bella must have been emotionally exhausted because her breathing evened out quite quickly; she had fallen asleep. I looked over at her clock that was on the table beside me before realizing that it was covered with a black shirt. I removed it and saw the time: 3:45am. We only had four more hours until we had to be back in that awful place to see our parents off before they were closed off to the world forever. I really wasn't looking forward to that at all, but I knew that it had to be done; there was no possible way for us to ignore what was going to happen.

Even though I had Bella by my side, I still longed for Rosalie to be there as well. She was my rock whenever I needed her, even though she had a bit of a bitchy exterior and everything, but she was exactly what I wanted by my side when I watched my parents lowered into the ground. I immediately felt guilty for thinking that though; why should I get to have the one person outside of the family that I truly love more than anything with me when Bella had no one else to turn to.

Bella rolled away from me then and it gave me the opportunity to return to my own bed to sleep, but I found myself not wanting to. Instead, I stood up and stretched, wandering out into the hall with the intention of just turning off the light, but I entered my room for a minute to grab my phone and send a quick text message to Rosalie. I wasn't sure if she would get it, or even respond to it, but I sent it all the same. After that was done, I turned off the lights and climbed back into bed beside Bella, drifting back off into a restless sleep.


	4. Break Apart Your Heart

**Hey there! Hope you enjoy this chapter! **

**Thanks to PachO'shea, piccolover22 and hanaharoo for your wonderful reviews!**

**Disclaimer: I do not own Twilight or any of its characters; they belong to the lovely Stephenie Meyer. I do however, own the plot.**

**Bella POV**

I drifted off into another restless sleep, but didn't end up screaming out again. After going in and out of sleep for the better part of an hour, I just decided to wake up; there was no point in trying to force myself to sleep when it inevitably wasn't going to happen. I tried to move, but felt two strong arms around me and froze. What the hell?

I turned my head a little and caught a glimpse of the shirt of the person that was holding me; _UW Huskies._

_ "Emmett,"_ I thought and looked away again.

I could remember that I was screaming out before and that Emmett had come in to comfort me, but I didn't think that he would actually stay and sleep in there. Now I felt bad; he deserved to be in his own bed resting for the next day. Or later on that day, I supposed, as it was only about 5:30 in the morning.

I tried once again to manoeuvre myself out of his grasp, but once I started wriggling around, his arms seemed to subconsciously tighten effectively holding me still. I sighed and lay my head back against his chest, there was evidently no way out of this situation until he woke up. I would just have to wait it out, I supposed.

I wasn't being ungrateful or anything for him being there, I was really happy that he was in the house with me and not stuck in the airport in Seattle any more. I knew that we had tons of things to figure out still together, but for right now, I was content just to be held by someone in the family; and not some distant cousin who claimed to know me or something worse, like still being totally alone.

I must have fallen back asleep again for I jumped myself awake when I dreamed that I had been hit by the truck instead of Mom and Dad. I saw the front end of the truck just about to ram into the car when I woke up a little disoriented for I had forgotten about Emmett being there with me. I was momentarily comforted though by the familiar presence of the weight of his arm resting on me. For a second I imagined that it was someone other than Em holding me like that in the morning, but I quickly banished all of those thoughts; it was gross of me for imagining so and there was also absolutely no way that any boy would ever want to hold me like that, even in my wildest dreams.

"Huh? What?" Emmett said groggily, settling back to sleep quickly with a snored and I giggled, trying to keep the sound down. I figured that when I had jumped myself away it must have woken him up as well. Realizing that I wasn`t going to get out of anything, I rolled over and moved the shirt out of my way so that I could look at the clock on my bedside table; I nearly had a heart attack when I saw the time displayed in the green numbers, double checking it just to make sure.

"Emmett!" I yelled, hitting his arm several times in many attempts to get him to move off of me. "Emmett wake up!"

"No Rose, not this time," he mumbled, and I turned around the other way to hit his chest instead as I knew that would have a better effect on him.

"No stupid, it's me; Bella! Get up!" I hit him in different spots of his upper body with each syllable of that sentence.

"Alright Bells, I'm up; what's the rush?" he finally responded, barely cracking an eye open to look down at me and I didn`t want him to fall back asleep again so I spoke to him in a louder voice.

"Let go," I struggled for a second until he seemed to come to his senses enough to drop his arms from around me, releasing me from his hold so I sat up as fast as I could, throwing the covers back and swinging my legs over the side of my bed. "The problem now is that it's 7:08am, Emmett. You try and figure it out."

I jumped off of the bed and immediately ripped the door to my closet open and started rifling through it looking for the old black dress that I had intended on wearing. Once I had located it at the very back of my closet, I turned to throw it back on the bed and saw that Emmett hadn't moved an inch.

"Emmett! I'm serious!" I placed the old dress on the knob of the door before I ran and jumped up and down on the bed right beside him, making him bounce around because he had fallen back asleep again.

"I just don't see what the problem is Bells," he whined and I sighed, still jumping pretty much on top of him but the movement wasn`t bothering him much.

"How do you not get it? It is now... 7:10am and we have to be at the funeral home by 7:45am to go over some stuff and close the caskets. It's a half hour drive, so technically speaking we're late!"

"What?" he rolled over to look at my alarm clock so I ceased all of my movements seeing as how he`d like come to life after that explanation; that and I didn`t want him to knock me right off of the bed with his rolling and all. After he had confirmed the time, Emmett swore something awful, jumped out from underneath my covers and raced out of my room, leaving me standing on my bed alone, so I kicked it into high gear as well and leapt down as well.

"How fast can you get ready, Bells?" Emmett yelled from his room where I heard the opening of his squeaky closet doors; one example of the numerous projects that Mom started but never finished around the house.

"Very!" I called back, putting the dress on over my head and smoothing it out before turning to slide a bra on quickly. I looked in the mirror over my dresser and decided against any make up, or leggings for that matter; for one, we didn't have time, and also I would just end up poking myself in the eye with something if I even tried the make-up part. Instead, I quickly ran a brush through my hair and grabbed a hair tie as I ran from the room and flew down the stairs, passing Emmett`s room on the way.

Once I reached the bottom, I threw the doors of the front hall closet open, dropped down to my knees and began searching around all of the shoes in there for my black ballet flats; there was no use risking me falling flat on my face during the whole ordeal, as it would only promote more sympathy from the on lookers and I didn`t want it in the beginning anyways. I located one shoe and threw it out, tossing some more to the side as I looked for the other one, shaking my head at the fact that one was never, ever able to find the shoes they need when they`re in a hurry.

"Bells, have you seen my suit jacket?" Emmett bellowed from a floor above, but I still heard him clear as day; he was one loud bugger. I looked up in the closet and rolled my eyes.

"It's hanging down here, where you left it at Christmas!" I yelled back, finding my other shoe and throwing it at the door to join the other one as I thundered down the hall towards the kitchen for the light sweater I had flung haphazardly on my chair at the table the night before.

I paused long enough to grab my keys from the little bowl on the counter by the kitchen door on my way out of the room, not even stopping long enough to feel bad about Dad`s spare cruiser keys that lay there as well as I sprinted to the front door just as Emmett came barrelling down the stairs two at a time. I was at the door first so I reached into the closet and yanked his jacked out carefully, holding it up and open for him to just slide into.

"Thanks Bells," Emmett said, slipping it on and shoving his feet into his shoes that just happened to be right at the front of the shoe mat in the closet, no thanks to my frantic digging before. "They're too small," he commented, glancing down at his feet before shrugging. "Oh well. Cell phone..." he said to himself, patting his jacket pockets uselessly and looking around the cramped space.

I rolled my eyes, shaking my head at him. "I'll be in the truck, Em."

I raced outside and hopped in the passenger's side of the truck as gracefully as I could in a dress, which wasn`t very graceful at all and reached over the bench seat to start it so that we were ready to go whenever Emmett decided that he was ready to go. About five seconds later, Emmett came out of the house and locked the door before half running, half hobbling towards the truck.

"I forgot about this beast," he commented, backing out of the driveway and throwing it into drive, speeding away from the curb. "We'd barely make it there in time in a regular car."

I stuck out my tongue and noticed him crack a small smile at his little jab towards my truck. I knew that he only half meant it that time, especially since there were no other options for us; it was my truck or nothing at all. Em turned off of our street and his cell phone started going off from somewhere that I couldn't even see for me to answer for him.

_"Baby take a seat, eyes on me, this is my show..."_ It sang from I assumed his pocket as he began fumbling around in that general area to get it out.

"Bells?" he asked but I scoffed at him right away.

"There are lots of things that I would do for you, but reaching in your pocket is not one of them Em," I answered, shaking my head as he looked towards me, raising his eyebrows asking me to get it. He huffed as it continued to sing out loud.

_"Your one and only pleasure, all dipped in lace and leather..."_

I actually listened to the lyrics his phone was emitting and my jaw dropped in shock, not at the song or anything, I`d heard worse in my life, but just at the awkwardness that it was creating in the small cab of my truck.

_"Fantasy, courtesy... on me baby let's go..."_

"Emmett, answer it!" I practically screeched at his awkward ringtone; I actually couldn't believe him and hoped that I never got to hear it again in my entire lifetime.

"If I could get it... ah, here!" Emmett finally got it out and threw it in my direction which was a dumb move, for I fumbled it for a second before dropping it to the floor at my feet.

_"Watch me apply the pressure, all decked in lace and leather..."_

"Hello?" I asked, bent over after retrieving the phone and I could tell that my face was a lovely shade of red after hearing that song.

"_Who's this_?" an unfamiliar high pitched female voice on the other end asked me.

"Uh...it's Bella?" I offered and there was a short pause before she spoke up again.

"_Oh... oH! Bella! Oh my gosh! Is everything okay? How are you doing? Oh, it's Rosalie, by the way; you know, Emmett's girlfriend_."

"Yeah, I know. Hi Rosalie. I'm doing okay, how about you?" I asked, giving Emmett one of those looks. I had never met Rosalie, but I could only imagine that she was actually as brainless as she seemed to be at that moment.

"_I'm fine, but that doesn't matter. Today's you know, the day, isn't it?_" she asked and I nodded my head, wanting to get off the phone, but not wanting to at the same time as it was the first contact that I had ever had with Emmett's girlfriend in the like three years that they had been dating.

"Yeah, it is. But shouldn't you be sleeping or something? I asked her, trying not to seem rude, but still wondering why she was calling so early in the morning at her end.

"Give me the phone," Emmett mouthed to me, but I shook my head; I wasn't going to pass it up any time soon.

"_Well, I couldn't sleep because I was worrying about you and Emmett, to be honest,_" she replied and I bit my lip to keep from snorting directly into the phone; that was a load of bogus.

"Oh, really? Well, we're doing just fine, so you don't need to worry about us at all."

"Bella, give me the damn phone," Emmett demanded, reaching out for it, but I held up one finger, wanting to hear what she said next.

"_I just hate the idea of you two being all alone out there. I just can't wait until you move up here. I've wanted to meet you for a long time, Emmett just goes on and on about you..."_

"What?" I interrupted her, but Emmett chose that moment to take the phone away from me before I could ask her exactly was she meant by that sentence.

"Hey, Rose? Hi baby, no... yeah, everything's okay. She's just a little nervous is all," he said into the phone, glaring at me, but I rolled my eyes and looked out the window, tuning out his conversation to focus on my own thoughts.

What Rosalie had said really bothered me. Was I really going to be moving up to rainy Seattle? I shuddered internally at the thought of leaving sunny Jacksonville. I loved the sun and the heat and to have to give it all up simply because I was a minor seemed wrong. But on the other hand, I couldn't exactly force Emmett into giving up his schooling and everything; it was pretty much a given that he wouldn't leave College, or would he? He had never spoken to me about it, but I wasn't going to push the issue unless he was.

My thoughts were interrupted as I heard the click of Emmett hanging up his phone and silence rang out though the cab.

"You okay Bella?"

"Ah, yeah. Just a little worried about today is all," I lied, but he seemed to buy it for once in our lives. Usually he was so attuned to how I was feeling that I couldn't get away with it, but considering the day and its events, he had a good excuse.

"I know, but it will be okay. I'm here and everything has been planned to the nines. Though we're about to mess it up already by being late," he said, nodding towards his cell phone that was lying on the bench between us. I picked it up, opening it up and saw the time: 7:50am.

"How far away are we?" I asked, starting to dial a number, feeling slightly guilty for using up some of his precious minutes in the process. He didn't have many to work with to begin with before I started using it right then.

"About ten minutes," he said. "Why?"

"I've got to phone them and tell them that we're running late, or else we'll be in trouble and they'll think that we've decided not to show up or something. Is it okay if I use your phone?" I asked, more as a formality than anything, for my thumb was about to press 'talk' anyways.

"Well what else are you going to use, your shoe?" he replied sarcastically as we coasted to a stop at a light and I closed my eyes before starting the call so that I didn't look around the intersection in case I started panicking again like I had when Angela and her Dad had first brought me home; they nearly turned around back to the hospital because I freaked out so badly. I didn't have any panic attacks the night before because I was emotionally wiped out.

I talked briefly to the director who was only too accepting of our lateness and true to Emmett's word we pulled into the parking lot ten minutes later. I still had my eyes closed, but once we were parked I opened them back up again I noticed a handful of cars already there and I felt guilty for making them wait. One of the attendants stuck a flag thing in the hood of my truck and I hopped out to the ground below, slamming the heavy door shut and all but running to the entrance so that we weren't any later.

"Well well, nice of you to show up," Lauren hissed at me as I stepped inside the front doors. "We don't wait around forever, you know. We were this close to moving them out of here without you," she held up her first finger and her thumb about a tenth of an inch apart to show her point but I ignored her, determined to be the bigger person as I waited for Emmett to get his butt in there.

"Get in there," she practically shoved me forward in the direction of the parlour that my parents were in, but I held my ground and remained in the spot, only wobbling a tiny bit.

"I'm not going in without Emmett," I said to her and planted myself to wait for him, wondering what the hell he was doing in the parking lot for so long.

"Oh no, you're going in there whether you like it or not; we just need one of you to start this," she placed a cold hand on the small of my back and tried to push me again, but I stood as still as I could, bracing my feet on the carpeted floor.

"Listen, you little brat, I don't care if you have parents or not, you are going in there right this second, even if I have to drag you in there by your hair and..." she stopped once we heard someone clearing their throat behind us.

"What's going on here?" Emmett asked and Lauren took a step back, giving him what I assumed was her 'seductive' look, but it really looked like she'd gotten some foul smell up her nose and was worried that someone would notice.

"Nothing Mr. Swan," she all but purred at him. "Isabella and I were just having a little chat. Now, it's time for you to get in there," she started to brush off invisible pieces of dust on his suit, but Emmett swatted her hand away. "Go ahead, and we'll get started," she grasped his upper arm and I swear I saw her give it a squeeze.

I turned on the spot, rolling my eyes and entered the parlour where people were milling around waiting for us. I blushed as they all looked at me, and I could feel Emmett's large hand on my back, guiding me to the front to the caskets.

"We're really sorry about being late," he addressed everyone courteously. "Bella and I had a bit of a late start and her truck isn't exactly the fastest thing in the world."

Everyone chuckled politely as we approached them and Emmett gently pulled me to my knees in front of Mom to show respect to her. I said a quick prayer for her and then looked in at her one last time. I couldn't believe this was goodbye. After this, I would never see my Mother's face again. She and Emmett were very much alike, so I knew that it would be particularly hard on him; she was where he got his exuberance from; his wayward way of life. They were very close, and he was truly a Momma's boy. Reality hit me hard when I realized that that was it and I choked back the tears, biting my lip and looking away from the casket at the awful putrid wallpaper on the walls for a moment before looking back.

"Goodbye Mom. I love you so much," I said to her body, hoping with everything that I had that somewhere up in heaven she had heard me.

Emmett said his goodbyes and then we moved over to Dad; Emmett dragged the little kneeling stool from Mom's casket to his and we kneeled together. Looking in at him was my undoing and big fat tears rolled down my cheeks while I did nothing to stop them. Charlie and I were very similar, which probably made us very close without either of us formally acknowledging it. We were both relatively quiet and kept things to ourselves; he loved to tease me occasionally, but it was just meaningless banter. I loved to go fishing with him once in awhile, mostly for the solitude that it provided; that was where we did the most talking, not that there was much of it anyways. The tears ran down my face, but I wiped them away. Charlie wouldn't want me to cry for him, even though I really couldn't control it at all.

"Bye Charlie. Save some fish up there for me. I love you so much." I knew that up in the heavens he would be chuckling at that.

Emmett squeezed my hand and together we stood up before he led me back away from our parents as Reverend Weber and the director with his assistant, who just happened to be Lauren, stepped forward. Reverend Weber recited a few verses as Renee's casket was prepared to be closed. I could have sworn I saw Lauren smirk, but the next second it was gone. With finality, the lid was closed over Renee's upper half and locked into place.

I could feel Emmett shaking, and I turned to the side to wrap both of my arms around him, giving him a gentle squeeze. He opened up his arms to hug me into his side, but I kept my face forward to watch them do the same to Charlie. When the lid on Charlie's casket closed, I lost it. I turned my face into Emmett's strong chest and cried. We probably looked very pathetic standing there in front of everyone, but I didn't care. I registered that someone was trying to hand us something, but I didn't see what it was before Angela took it from them. I gave her a grateful smile and she nodded.

They called for the pallbearers then, so I had to let go of Emmett. I stood with my arms wrapped around my body as he and five other men from our family circled Renee and lifted her up, carrying her outside and into the waiting hearse. They then returned to do the same to Charlie, and I followed them out. Director Paul closed the back door of the hearse and I waited for Emmett to take his hand off of the side of the car before we walked together towards the truck in silence; we didn't speak during the short ride to the church either.

Emmett parked and we got out to stand beside the hearses and wait around while everyone got organized enough to proceed. I looked up at the gray sky above, really looking at it for the first time that day just as I did a little ray of sunlight managed to peek its way through the clouds and lit up a small piece of the earth just in front of me. I knew that it was Mom and Dad trying to tell me that everything was okay, but I still couldn't find it in myself to believe it. I did smile to myself a tiny bit at the thought of them still being with us even though I was standing beside their lifeless bodies and I felt a tiny bit better, but not much at all.

As I was standing there in my own little world, I didn't notice the trouble that was apparently brewing until Emmett clapped a hand on my shoulder, breaking me out of my little spell.

"You okay, Bells?" he asked me gently and I nodded, letting him turn me around to face everything.

I realized then that we had run into a little snag; they wanted to bring both the caskets in at the same time but there was barely enough people for the job; between the very little family that we had and some of the people from the police force, there wasn't a lot of people at the funeral. Some uncle of ours ran inside to recruit a few more helpers and I noticed that Emmett was just sort of standing there, looking between Mom and Dad, as if he were deciding between them.

"You take Mom," I whispered to him, giving him a gentle push in her direction. "I've got Dad."

"Bells, it's heavy you..." he protested but I shook my head, cutting him off before he could finish, which was a rarity but I didn't get to gloat about it.

"I'll be fine," I reassured him and took my place at the back of the open hearse not wanting to hear what else he had to say about the matter.

Instead, Emmett just nodded and went to stand with Mom, seeming to accept that I wasn't budging on that one. The other helpers came out and stood around as they started to get Dad out of that dreadful car. I reached forward to help them, but was stopped by someone's hand on my forearm. I looked up and a man that I thought was from Dad's work shook his head at me, stepping in front of me and fully intending to push me out of the way and take my place.

"I'm going to do it," I said quietly, but firmly so that he got my message.

"But Isabella, there's no way that you can; just let us do it, please," he said to me, and I shook my head, thinking that the guy was stupid to not only call me by my full name, but to also try and cross me.

"Look, this is my Father, and I am going to help carry him whether you like the idea or not," I started to get really defensive and would fight this stranger if I had to, police officer or not, but Emmett stepped in between us just then.

"Just let her do it," he said in an almost quiet menacing voice to the other guy who looked up at Em with wide eyes.

"But—"

Emmett simply shook his head and grabbed the back of the guy's jacket and pulled him out of the way so I could resume my position. The stupid guy walked away then, muttering under his breath about how I couldn't do it and I was just a girl and a little kid and all. In order to defy him and what he believed, I grabbed a hold of the bar and readied myself for the weight with my head held high; I was going to do this just to prove random guy wrong.

"Thanks Em," I said and he nodded, jogging back over to Mom.

We were given the signal and crouched down to lift up the caskets and although I had braced myself for the weight of it, I still managed to stumble a little bit. Luckily for me it went relatively unnoticed by everyone else, as there were five other strong men holding it as well. I regained my balance and watched as Emmett and the others carried Reneé inside the church. Once they were inside the first set of doors, we started our slow shuffle forwards. Two attendants opened the second set of doors, revealing the very ornate inside of the church and we all started to slowly walk down the aisle towards the alter.

As we were walking forwards, I couldn't help but to think that I was walking down the aisle of a church way too early. I was meant to do it on my wedding day with Charlie at my side, walking me down to meet the man of my dreams and giving me away to him. Instead, there I was at 17 years of age carrying my father down the aisle; it was totally reversed and I hated that. The thought of it made me burst into tears and my vision was clouded over completely by them so I could hardly see anything in front of me. I still continued on though and didn't give up no matter how crappy I felt.

We placed them on some stands that were set up and then everyone took their seats. As the rest of the pallbearers were heading back, Emmett turned to me and held his hand out for me to take. I vaguely recognized the small, frail arm that extended from my body to take his, but I didn't actually remember my brain giving it the order to. He slowly led me back to our seats in the first row and Reverend Weber proceeded with the ceremony.

**A/N: Sorry for the lack of reviews for both this story and SIAS. I really have no excuse for this one other than I suck at focussing on editing these chapters!**

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	5. In Her Head

**Chapter five for you!**

**Thanks so much to PachO`shea, berdb, piccolover22 and hanaharoo for your wonderful reviews!**

**Disclaimer: I do not own Twilight or any of its characters; they belong to the lovely Stephenie Meyer. I do however, own the plot.**

**Rosalie POV**

I snapped my phone shut after speaking to both Bella and Emmett and I sighed, shifting my weight onto my right leg, popping out my hip while combing my fingers through my hair to make sure it was still semi-curly and began to tap the toe of my left heel on the ground impatiently. It was evident from the way that Emmett was speaking that he was not only devastated about everything, but also stressed too; and as much as everyone said that I was only concerned about myself, I was more worried about Emmett in that moment than me.

"How is he?" Alice's small voice tinkled as she asked me that, while she was walking over to stand beside me and I looked down at her short form practically bouncing on the spot as she 'stood'. I gave her a small shake of my head to answer Alice's question instead of verbally answering, but I realized that I would have to anyways; that's just how she worked.

"Oh Rosalie," she practically cried, wrapping her arms around me and I returned the gesture gently. Alice seemed to know just how strung I was at the fact that Emmett was hurting and I was nowhere near him; she just seemed to know those kinds of things.

"Jasper and Edward are just finishing up getting the rest of the luggage and then we'll be out of here, okay?" she said, letting me go and smiling up at me sympathetically.

"I just wish that I was there already," I told her, smiling tightly and she nodded in response.

"I know, Rose, but we're almost there," she said, giving me one last squeeze before letting go of me completely and stepping away. I noticed a few people looking at us, so I just glared at them and they kept on moving, averting their eyes from my gaze.

_"That's right,"_ I thought. _"You just keep on walking by."_

I glanced down at my phone again, becoming impatient with the boys for not being fast enough. I noted the time displayed on the screen before looking up to scan the crowd for any sign of them; luckily enough, I spotted a tuft of bronze hair sticking up above the heads of the people around him making its way over to Alice and I; a blonde head bobbing beside it.

"Thank God," I mumbled to myself as they drew nearer to us, both pushing carts full of luggage.

"Alice, how much did you pack?" Edward asked while shaking his head and pushing the cart that held her two massive bags and one of his own.

"Enough Edward. We were going to Jacksonville; I needed options for the warmer weather," Alice replied rolling her eyes and pulling out her phone to answer a text or something.

"All right, we've got to get going or we'll be really late," I said, grabbing my carry-on from where it was propped on the floor beside my feet and turning to walk towards the exit.

I lead the group of them wordlessly through the automatic doors and down to the car rental desk; once it was in sight, I began to rummage through my purse for the rental information so that I could check in, nearly dropping my Blackberry onto the ground in the process.

"Shit!" I said rather loudly as I juggled with the device, catching it just in time before pulling out the paperwork.

"Let me take care of this," Jasper said gently in my ear, taking the information from my hands and I nodded in agreement; I was a little on-edge because I wanted to be with Emmett so bad that it might not fare well for whoever was behind the counter. Instead, I took out my sunglasses, closed up my purse, slung it over my shoulder and ran a hand through my hair all in the same movement.

"Did you talk to Emmett?" Edward asked from where he was standing to the left of me, leaning his forearms on the handle of the luggage cart, his phone delicately balanced in his fingers.

"I talked to Bella too; she answered the phone, actually," I said, walking over to the big glass window and staring out at the palm trees that were swaying a bit in the wind, leaving Edward and Alice to stand a few feet behind me with the luggage.

"Did you get to talk to her for long?" Alice inquired and I shrugged.

"Not really, but then again she was only answering Em's phone. I think that it's a bit of a bad morning for them," I told her, looking at my reflection in the glass and sliding my sunglasses down over my blue eyes.

"Oh, yeah that's understandable. I mean, I can't imagine what they're going through and everything. Don't worry, I'm sure that they'll be glad to see you," she said, probably with a cheery smile on her face but I didn't bother turning around to look.

I knew that they were just trying to help me, and that it wasn't their fault that I was feeling so down, but I couldn't help myself. Every time that I had talked to Emmett he seemed absolutely crushed; especially that first time he had called after the visitation. I hated leaving him in the airport back in Seattle and didn't see a way for me to be there for him until Alice came up with one of her famous plans; this time it was actually for someone's real benefit though.

With some sheer dumb luck and a little money, we had gotten a direct flight from Seattle to Jacksonville, which had landed us in the warm airport we were all standing in the morning of Em's parents' funeral. We had all changed on the plane into appropriate funeral attire; which made us look a little funny in the airport, but I had every intention of going straight from the airport to the funeral home with no stops in between.

I heard Jasper calling my name then and I returned to them, checking the time and groaned, seeing that we were running a little late; and I always got really pissed when we were late to places.

"Did you get the car?" I asked Jasper, probably a little too harshly and he nodded, showing me the keys in his hands, while handing me the rental agreement to hold on to. I shoved it into my purse and nodded, sighing impatiently.

"It's relatively close to the building, so Edward's going to run out and get it for us," Jasper told me calmly, tossing the keys to Edward, who miraculously caught them, as he was paying more attention to his phone than anything else. Edward looked up at the three of us, looking us all in the eye before he took off running for the door with the pissed off look on my face.

"I swear that boy lives with his phone glued to his person," Alice grumbled and I couldn't help but to laugh out loud at her comment, taking Edward's cart and pushing it forward roughly; she was very right about that.

"I bet he'd go into with drawl if we took it away from him," I called out to her over my shoulder and she laughed evilly in response.

"No doubt he would," she said, catching up to me and rolling her eyes. "We should try it some time; that would be fun!"

I simply shook my head at the stupid plan; as much as I liked to pester Edward, she would have to do that one alone while I simply watched or something. Even I wasn't that stupid to mess with an already irritable Edward by doing that.

"Alice, how is it that I'm pushing all of your luggage while you simply dance along beside me?" I asked her, rolling my eyes at Jasper who'd caught up with us, but he just smiled lovingly down at her across my cart nearly making me gag with cuteness.

"Because I can't see very well over the cart, so I'd just bump into people. And it's heavy," she replied, cheerily. "Plus, you seem to be doing a good job of parting the masses since you're practically glaring at them all."

"I am not," I replied, knowing that I was doing that, but it was only because we were in a hurry.

"Are too," Jasper teased from my other side and I intentionally glared at him; giving him my second best evil eye.

"Hop on, Pixie, we're going to be late if you don't," I instructed her with no room for argument in my tone and she lithely jumped onto the front of the cart, neatly folding herself down with all of the luggage before I charged through the rest of the crowd and through another set of automatic doors that lead us outside.

"Oh my god the humidity!" Alice practically shrieked as the heat hit us like a wall right as soon as we walked outside; I ground to a halt when she started screaming, not entirely sure what was going on and I saw Jasper follow suit. "Where the hell is Edward with that car? It had better have air conditioning or so help me..."

I stood there laughing at Alice and I turned away to avoid her glare, catching Jasper's eye and seeing that he was biting his lip to hold it in as well. I knew that she couldn't do too much to me, but she would surely cut Jasper off if she caught him laughing at her as well. She didn't like to be ridiculed in any way, but I appeared to be the exception to her little rule.

Just then a car honked its horn and right before I turned my head to look at who made the noise, a silver Mercedes pulled up to a stop in front of us. I shielded my eyes against the sun with my hand completely forgetting that I had my sunglasses on, and saw that it was Edward in the front seat right before the door opened and he hopped out of the opposite side.

"We'd better hurry, I don't think I'm supposed to park here," he announced, opening the trunk and taking a suitcase from Jasper before flinging it inside. "Not that I care much, but I for one don't want an out-of-state ticket. They're a bitch to clear."

"Of course you would know, right?" I pointed my finger at him before pushing my cart over to the boys and he smiled innocently. "And since when do you care about where you park, whether we're in Washington or not?" I asked him even though I already knew the answer.

"It it open?" Alice asked, hopping up from the cart, sending it flying and Jasper chased it down while Edward nodded, oblivious to the whole episode. "There had better be flipping air conditioning in there or else..." she muttered before closing herself in the backseat.

"Rose, you can get in as well, Edward and I will handle the rest of the stuff and then we'll get going," Jasper said to me, placing his hand on my arm and I nodded a tiny bit, eyeing him a little.

"You sure? I mean, I could help if you want..." I half- offered out of courtesy for my brother when in reality I didn't want to ruin the manicure that I had just gotten a few days prior to everything happening with Emmett.

"Just get in the damn care Rosalie," Edward said, throwing another bag in the trunk and I glared at him before stomping off to the front and folding myself into the passenger seat, taking shotgun away from him.

I rolled my eyes and shook my head back and forth as I felt a blast of cold air hit me when I closed the door. I was only a tiny bit shocked to see that Alice was leaning forward through the two front seats, with her head tipped towards the vents, blowing the air directly onto her hair.

"My hair didn't stand up, did it Rose?" she asked, not turning her head to look up at me and I managed to bite back a laugh, using all of the power in my body at the seemingly innocent question.

"You're seriously asking me that, Alice?" I asked touching her hair and smiling for she always spiked her short hair up every single day; so essentially it always stood up.

Both of the doors on the driver's side opened up then and I couldn't help but to laugh at the situation then, feeling tears sting at the corners of my eyes because of it. I didn't have a clear visual on either Jasper or Edward, but I could only imagine the looks of shock on their faces once they realized what exactly Alice was doing.

"Sweetheart, what are you doing?" Jasper asked Alice over my laughter, and I was able to detect a hint of amusement in his voice, making his southern accent come out even more.

Jasper and I had grown up in Texas, but where my accent had basically disappeared, his reared its ugly head when he was either pissed off, highly amused, or as Alice _so kindly_ told me, when he was 'in the moment'.

"What the hell?" I heard Edward say from the back seat as I saw his hand reach forward to grab a hold of Alice's collar and he effectively pulled her back into the seat with him. "Seriously, Alice?"

"It's hot," she pouted and I began to sober up, only to look at Jasper's bewildered face next to mine and start laughing all over again. Even though he had been dating her since June and it was almost February, there were still things about her that he was probably learning every day; like the fact that she would cool her hair in the car like that if she was desperate enough.

"All right, let's get this freak show on the road," Edward muttered from the back seat and I took much deeper breaths so that I could try and calm myself down. It started working, much to my relief and I flipped down the mirror on the sun shade to see if any of my make-up had gotten messed up.; luckily, it hadn't.

Jasper shook his head and pulled away from the curb as we started to drive further into Jacksonville, taking many turns around the corners. Alice was practically glued to the window, pointing out the different things that she saw, but I tuned her out, my thoughts drifting once again to Emmett and what he was going through. It still hadn't sunk in with me fully, as it had been a bit of a whirlwind few hours while we got him out of the city and out on his flight. Em's parents were nothing but nice to me when I had gone down to visit them and I knew that they would be missed very much.

As we got closer to the funeral home as dictated to us by the GPS on Jasper's phone I began to get antsy. I was sure that it was a side of me that was new to Alice and Edward, for they stopped the bantering that they had going on in the backseat, but Jasper was no stranger to how I reacted to things. When it told us we were around the corner, I looked at the clock and began to panic; seeing that the funeral was about to start at any minute from the time that Emmett had told me, and was internally worried that we would be late.

I felt a hand on my arm and looked to see that it was Jasper, and immediately I began to feel a lot calmer. Jasper had always had a sort of calming effect about him, ever since we were little kids, and I smiled in thanks for him at that moment, to which he nodded; twin telepathy was really helpful sometimes. It was moments like those that I really did love having him as a brother, other times he was just a pain in my ass.

Jasper pulled into the parking lot of the church just in time; we could see the procession slowly making its way down the street and the first hearse was just turning into the driveway. I opened my little compact that I had thought to stuff into my purse at the last second and checked my make-up, applying just a little bit more lipstick and puffing up my hair a tiny bit before snapping it tightly shut.

"Okay, let's go," I said to them, putting my brave face on and jumping out of the car quickly with enough time to straighten my black skirt as Alice, Jasper and Edward climbed out as well.

They all sort of looked around and I rolled my eyes before marching ahead of them, hoping that they'd all follow me; not that they'd go anywhere else, but still.. Once I got to the doors, someone opened them up for me and I nodded my head to thank them before walking inside. I waited for a minute before the door opened again and the other three walked in as well.

"Thank goodness for air conditioning," Alice said; fanning herself a little bit while Edward rolled his eyes and shoved his hands inside the pockets of his pants.

"Alice, you were only outside for like a minute and a half," he pointed out and she gave him one of her patented Alice glares. We were all too used to them though and that shit only worked on outsiders anymore.

"You would be concerned too if you were a girl. I don't want my hair to go all frizzy and be gross," she shot back, touching her short hair for good measure.

"What hair?" I heard him mutter under his breath as I shook my head.

"Knock it off you two," I said to them sharply as Alice gave him one of her famous pouts and went to stand beside Jasper who instantly wrapped her up in his embrace. "We're here to support Emmett and Bella, we shouldn't be arguing about silly things."

"You're right," Alice told me, her pout disappearing in the blink of an eye. "Sorry Rose."

"I'm not your mother, you don't need to apologize to me," I told her, smirking and shaking my head.

The front door started to open again and revealed a glimpse of a hearse so I quickly ushered Jasper, Edward and Alice further inside the church, choosing a middle pew for us to sit in and forcing them down into the shadows so we wouldn't be seen right away because as far as Emmett was concerned, we were all back in Seattle in class right now.

I looked sideways to my right at my brother and our friends; Alice was fanning herself again while Jasper was wringing his hands and Edward was eyeing the grand organ at the top of the alter. We were so lucky that none of us had major papers or exams to write so that we could all get away and support Em. Alice and I had of course used our female powers on all of our professors; my persuasiveness plus her pouty face pretty much guaranteed us anything we wanted in life. It was a bad way of accomplishing things, but we were pressed for time and needed to be here; there was no way that we could have missed it for the world.

Jasper started massaging his forehead and I frowned at him, knowing that he was feeling funny again. Being twins, we seemed to be attuned to each other more than normal and I knew exactly how he was feeling right then and there.

"Are you okay?" I whispered to him and he nodded, shrugging to tell me that it was just the usual. Jasper seemed to be very in tune with other people's emotions, so at events like weddings or funerals he was bombarded by different emotions and sometimes found it hard to cope. I knew that today he would grin and bear it for Emmett's sake though and I appreciated that.

The doors at the back that we had just come through opened to reveal the first set of pallbearers carrying the first casket. Right in the front was Emmett and he was pulling it down the aisle with one hand. I couldn't help but to appraise him and how he looked in his suit. I could tell that the huge biceps he had worked so hard to build up over the years were bulging and flexing under his suit jacket and it made me lick my lips a little at the thought of touching them.

"He looks so..." Alice started to say, but then was at a loss for words, which was a very big deal for Alice.

"Broken?" Jasper offered and I knew that she was nodding without even looking back at her. That was exactly how my baby looked and I hated it; I hated that all I could do for him was sit there in the pew of the church and watch as he tried to compose himself for everyone, but I could tell that he really was broken. Rightfully so though, considering all the hell that he had been through.

"He looks almost normal compared to her," Edward observed and I frowned a little, still focussed on Emmett as he neared the alter, turning the casket sideways in the process.

"Compared to who?" I asked, turning to look at Edward and he just nodded behind me towards the slow procession. When I turned my head around, I was not prepared for what I saw at all, and that's saying a lot.

A small girl, probably just a bit taller than Alice with long brown hair was at the front of the second casket, holding on to it with both hands for dear life, almost like it was her lifeline. She was very slight and frail, and I was afraid that her arms were going to break off while she was carrying the heavy thing. What got me the most was her face; she looked so sad and defeated. Her cheeks were sunken and there were huge black bags under her eyes.

She looked up for a second and I noticed that her eyes were a beautiful chocolate brown, but they were so sad that it almost choked me up. She looked very frightened and vulnerable and I couldn't blame her one bit. I knew that it was bad of me, but I actually pitied the girl and wanted to take away all of her pain and suffering with just one look at her. Helping the less fortunate was _not_ something that I did, but since she was Emmett's sister and all I really wanted to help her.

"She's in so much pain," Jasper muttered and I nodded in agreement just as she burst into tears and the fat salty drops fell down her cheeks.

"She's pretty though," Alice added and no one spoke after that.

Once the caskets had been set down and the men had walked away, Emmett sauntered up to the girl who was most definitely Bella and held his hand out for her to take. I literally held my breath waiting for her to take it; she was very hesitant. I wasn't normally a very maternal person or anything, but at that second, I wanted to wrap her up in a giant hug and take care of her. I didn't want any more harm to come to her; she deserved a normal, happy life after everything that she had been through in just a couple of days. I couldn't imagine having to bury one of my parents, let alone both of them before my 18th birthday.

I bit my lip as the ceremony started and felt Jasper's warm hand wrap around mine, giving it a gentle squeeze. I looked at him and gave him the slightest of smiles in thanks, to which he merely nodded in acknowledgement before leaning down to kiss the top of Alice's head. She was completely wrapped around him and wiping her eyes with a tissue, and I bet that she was very glad that she had made us stop to get the waterproof mascara in the duty-free shop before we had boarded the plane. Looking further down, Edward was sitting very still and had a very sober look on his face, for once he wasn't typing on his phone. I knew that he saw Emmett like a big brother and it was probably very hard to see the person that you looked up to looking so defeated the way Emmett did right now.

I focussed my attention back up front, but quickly tuned everything out and just watched Emmett and Bella. It was very easy to see that Bella was completely distraught, and I didn't blame her one bit. Someone sitting behind her with brown hair and glasses leaned forwards and offered her a tissue, which she took and nodded in thanks before turning around again. I saw Emmett looking down at her, concerned about his little sister before wrapping his big, strong, muscular arm around her and tucking her protectively into his side. I knew that if Emmett had his way, from then on Bella wouldn't be going anywhere or doing anything without someone with her at all times. I nearly lost it myself when I saw a big fat tear rolling down his face as well. He tried to wipe it away and shrug it off, but I saw that he chanced a glance over at the two caskets and broke right down into tears.

That was my undoing. Seeing my big, tough, football playing boyfriend cry like that made the tears roll down my face as well. Alice passed me a tissue and I wiped my eyes, cursing the fact that I hadn't worn the waterproof mascara she had bought; it was probably running all down my face.

**Emmett POV**

The ceremony went well; at least the parts of it that I actually paid attention to did. I felt slightly guilty for not being able to pay attention for the entire thing, but I had other things on my mind; Bella being my number one priority. Throughout the whole thing, she sobbed into my side and I could feel her little form shaking. I wanted so badly to take the pain away from her and make her feel better, but then I realized that we both needed to feel this to help us heal. If she didn't shed a tear over something as tragic as this, I would have sent her to shrink or something. Crying was part of the natural grieving process and it was something that she needed to do.

I wished so much that it wasn't our parents up there in those wooden boxes. I wished that they were here with us and that we were at this church on a happier occasion. I decided that if worst came to worst, I wished that we could have either Mom or Dad with us for this and be looking at only one casket up there. At least then I would know that Bella would have been in good hands after all of it.

One of our Aunts on Dad's side got up to give the eulogy and as soon as she started talking about Charlie and Renee being wonderful parents to Bella and I, I got to thinking about what was going to happen after this. Would I still be able to afford school? What was going to happen to Bella? I sighed and looked down at her as Angela reached forward to hand her a tissue and I wrapped my arm around her. One thing was for sure, Bella wouldn't be allowed to go anywhere without someone watching over her. I wouldn't be able to live my life if she were taken away from me as well.

As Reverend Weber started directly addressing Bella and me, I tuned back in and couldn't stop the tears from falling down my face. He wrapped it up fairly quickly with one last prayer before the pallbearers were called forward again. I didn't stand up this time to help, but instead pulled Bella to her feet and took her small hand in mine, opting to follow behind the procession. The two of us walked hand in hand out of the church while everyone else filed out behind us until there was a small crowd outside, witnessing the caskets being placed back inside the hearses. The director addressed the crowd, telling them the location of the cemetery where the next part of this horrible day would take place.

"Mr. Swan will you be alright to drive back to the cemetery?" he asked me and I nodded.

"I'll be fine," I replied and he nodded, jumping into the hearse as I turned towards Bella's truck.

I chanced a glance over at Lauren who appeared to smirk at Bella and I but the next second that I looked at her she was standing calmly with no trace of emotion on her face. I shook it off and led Bella back to the truck. I opened her door, but instead of climbing inside, she turned to face me, tilting her head up and looking me right in the eyes. I pushed the hair out of her face and was immediately struck by the raw emotion that clouded her features and wrapped my arms tightly around her, crushing her to my chest. It seemed to me that my baby sister had aged more in the last week than she had all through high school and I hated that she had to grow up even more than necessary.

"Why Em, why did they have to go?" she whispered before I could hear her sniffles and she started shaking with sobs again.

"I don't know Bella. But I'm going to make this right," I told her before starting to cry again myself.

**Rosalie POV**

Once we got outside the church, I looked around for Emmett and Bella and saw that they were nowhere to be found. I turned around on my right heel on the spot, looking here, there and everywhere and coming up with nothing.

"Where the hell are they?" I asked the others and they too began to look around. I was becoming more and more frustrated that I couldn't see them, for what I really wanted to do was run into Emmett's arms to console him.

I noticed a blonde woman with a tan so fake that it was practically orange staring off into the distance and looked a bit spaced out. I rolled my eyes at her, following her line of vision only to see that she was looking directly at an old, red truck that Emmett was opening the door to. I glared at the back of her head before calling to the others.

"I've found them, they're over by a truck," I said and Jasper turned around, nodding once he too caught sight of them.

"I actually just want to wrap her up in a big hug and take away all her problems," Alice said out loud and I nodded in agreement.

"We should go over there and make sure that they're okay," Edward suggested, already starting to walk in their direction.

Jasper, Alice and I walked quickly to keep up with Edward's pace and once we were about halfway there, Emmett pulled Bella to his chest and together they began to cry.

"They are not driving over there themselves," I stated and Jasper nodded. "Someone's got to drive our rental over and someone else can take the truck. I don't care who does what."

I waited until we got a little closer before I spoke to Emmett and Bella. I held my arm out for Jasper, Alice and Edward to stop before I made any sort of advance.

"Emmett?" I called out softly to him, not entirely sure if he heard me,

He must have heard me, for seconds later he lifted his head up and over in the direction that my voice must have floated over to him from and he noticed me, looking right into my eyes. Emmett frowned slightly before unwrapping one of his arms from around Bella and holding it out in my direction, beckoning me towards him.

I started out slowly walking towards him and saw Emmett lean down to Bella and whisper something to her, to which she nodded and stepped back, out of his embrace. Once he freed himself from his sister, he started briskly walking towards me and I jogged as best I could towards him, considering that I was in 3 inch heels, meeting him in the middle and being wrapped up in his arms; my favourite place in the entire world.

"Rose, you're here. I can't believe you're actually here," he said to me before putting me back down on solid ground.

"I'm here for you, Emmett," I told him, running my hand through his dark curly hair. "I'm always here for you. I wouldn't miss this for the world."

"Thank you," he replied, pulling me close again and squishing me up against his chest and for once in my life I didn't mind in the slightest.

**AN: So a little Rosalie POV for you... hope I did it justice! Very nerve wracking!  
Let me know what you think!**

**The next chapter for L&LD will be up tomorrow, if you were wondering!  
Review :)**


	6. An Unlikely Ally

**Hey guys. Happy New Years! I'm one of those losers who don't go out for it, so instead you get an update that is 5 months late... *sighs* There will be a full explanation in the latest SIAS update in the next day or so.**

**Thanks to ASHLEYYYBLACKBERRYYY, hanaharoo, piccolover22 and GenesisCM for your reviews!**

**Disclaimer: I do not own The Host or any of its characters; they belong to the lovely Stephenie Meyer. I do however, own the plot.**

**Bella POV**

While I was standing out in the parking lot in Emmett's arms receiving the biggest bear hug of my life I thought that I heard his name being called but I wasn't entirely sure so I didn't say anything to him. A few moments later I felt Em pick up his head and turn in the direction that the noise was coming from before he gasped.

"What is it?" I asked a bit reluctantly, figuring that it was another second cousin or something; I was not in the mood to be faced with more of them and their sympathy for us. When I felt Emmett begin to unwrap his arm from around my shoulders I knew it was something more than just another prying cousin; he wouldn't have responded to that, I was sure of it.

"Bella, there are some people here that I want you to meet. They mean the world to me, and..."

"It's Rosalie, isn't it?" I asked, interrupting him before he could even really get started with his explanation, taking a step back from Emmett. I looked up at my big brother and he just put on a sheepish face, smiling a little bit and I knew my answer right then; I was ninety-nine percent sure that she was the only person who could make him smile, even in a situation like ours.

It hurt me a little bit that he was willing to smile at the prospect of her being there when I couldn't get him to right then, but then I felt horrible for being jealous of her. I realized that if she was able to bring a little light to Em's darkness then she obviously really meant something to him and I was grateful for that.

"Is it okay that she's here?" he asked me, standing back from me to look down right at my face and seeming almost scared for my answer, which was completely absurd. I nodded before backing away from Em in a silent gesture for him to go and greet his girlfriend.

"I didn't know they were coming," he said, looking over my shoulder at her and I smiled a little tiny one at him, nodding my head in her direction and he didn't have to be told twice.

Emmett began to jog around me towards his girlfriend so I turned around to actually meet and greet her for the first time. She was a bit farther away than I thought she was, and I only got a little glimpse of her before Emmett scooped the girl up and held her tight to him in one of his patented bear hugs.

From what I could gather, she was tall and blonde and was totally the type of girl that I pictured Em dating; the over-excited cheerleader type that she looked like. I wouldn't doubt that she was on the squad at U of W, and that they met at a pep rally for one of Emmett's football games or something; he had never actually told me the story of how they met.

I noticed that she was wearing a pair of very tall, pointy, death trap looking heels and a white collared shirt that was tucked into a black high waist skirt that fell to her knees. Just looking at her, I concluded that she was beautiful and was probably rich and stuck up, and knowing that I couldn't be as gorgeous as her, even in my wildest dreams gave my ego a large bruising.

While they reconnected, I looked away to give them a little privacy and finally noticed that there were three more people standing about two feet away from Em and Rosalie. I automatically assumed that they were Emmett's other friend; I could never seem to remember the names of them, even though he had told me a number of times and showed me pictures. Even if I had recalled those conversations, it was totally different seeing people in real life as opposed to in photographs or by words.

There was a short girl standing between two taller men; she was very, very short, with black spiky hair that seemed to stand up all over the place, but it also looked like she had individually stuck up each strand of hair to make it look that way. She was wearing a small black strapless dress that had some sort of beading up the right side of it, and when she turned around to speak to the boy on her left, I could see that there was a corset in the back that was done up with a pink ribbon. The short girl noticed that I was staring right at her and flashed me a beautiful smile which I didn't return and looked down at the ground by my feet instead like a coward.

After the proper amount of time had passed so that I didn't look like a total creeper I looked back up, thankful to see that she had looked away from me and focussed my attention to the boy on her left that she had spoken to before instead. He was much taller than her; the tallest of the three standing there, and had placed his arm around her tiny waist. I deduced that they were dating from the way that they were standing close to each other. He had short, sort of curly blonde hair that matched Rosalie's and I figured that they were siblings or something. He was in an ordinary suit; black pants, white shirt and a black jacket, with a pink tie that matched the colour of the ribbon on the back of the girl's dress. I imagined that he was probably a little more than warm in that heavy jacket in the Florida sun at this hour, but he didn't take it off.

The last boy who was on the girl's right was definitely striking to look at. He was wearing a suit almost identical to the other boy's, but he had already taken off the jacket and was beginning to loosen up his black tie. I could see that under the white shirt, he was quite muscular and I wondered if he too was in the football program. He had a chiselled jaw and a perfect nose and when his eyes locked with mine for the fraction of a second before I looked away, I saw that they were the most brilliant green that I had ever seen in my life. His hair was a bronze color that looked very natural, not something out of a box that some of the guys here liked to experiment with, and it looked like he had run his hand through it no less than a thousand times. To confirm my suspicion, as the trio made their way over to Emmett and Rosalie, he lifted his hand up and brushed it through his hair pushing it back off his forehead.

I sighed and opened the door to my cab before hopping up into the truck, leaving the door open to let the air circulate while they caught up with each other; I wanted to give them their space and not seem like the nosy little sister. A couple of minutes later I happened to glance in the side mirror and saw that the first hearse was beginning to pull away and I unnecessarily panicked.

"Emmett! We've got to go," I called out to him, leaping from the truck, wobbling upon making impact with the nasty ground, and pointed behind the group of them at the hearse. He looked over to where I was pointing, finally noticing that the procession was starting and nodded.

"Okay I'll get in, look guys I'll see you-"he twirled the keys around his finger and started to walk over to the driver's side of our truck, but his girlfriend stopped him before he could get too far from her. I could hear her words carry the distance from where they were standing to where I was.

"Emmett, we don't exactly think that it's the safest thing in the world for you to be driving right now. You're an emotional wreck, honey and we don't want anything to happen to you. Let someone else drive the truck over and we'll take you there."

He seemed to think it over for about a half a second before nodding; she did have a point as Em was shaking like a leaf to begin with. Emmett turned to the boy with the bronze hair and began to speak.

"Take care of her," he said before handing the boy the keys. As I got back in the truck and closed my door, I couldn't help but to wonder if Emmett was talking about the truck or me.

Before I had time to ponder it too much further, the driver's door had opened and the bronze haired boy hopped in quite smoothly shutting the door gently and placing the key in the ignition, quickly starting it. I reached back and snapped my seatbelt into place and heard two clicks at the same time instead of just one. I looked over at the boy and he smiled a little before doing something I wasn't expecting; reaching over and giving my seatbelt a tug.

"Hey, what are you doing?" I protested, swatting his hand out of the way as a reflex motion to him invading my personal bubble like that but he was quicker; his hand was already gone and shifting the truck into drive.

"Emmett told me to take care of his precious cargo, and I was just making sure that she was safe," he replied, his voice sounding like velvet and my ears liked the sound of it.

"I...I think that he meant the car. I mean, my truck, she's very old and she means a lot to me," I explained stuttering a bit. _Smooth, Bella_, I thought and concentrated on looking out the front windshield instead of talking any more as we pulled out of the parking lot and onto the road in the procession.

"I'm Edward Cullen, by the way," he said to me when we stopped at a red light and I turned to see that he was smiling a bit, holding out his right hand for me to shake.

"I'm..."

"Isabella Swan," he finished for me and I nodded.

"Bella, actually," I corrected him, reaching out to shake his hand in return, but as soon as our skin touched, I jerked my hand back as it felt like I had been burned by his skin. I immediately looked up at Edward to see if he had any reaction, but his face was like stone with no emotions registering across it; maybe it was just me and I was hallucinating or something. I didn't know what to say, but he broke the silence for me.

"Of course it is," he said, cryptically, stepping on the gas once the light turned green and I frowned in confusion, forgetting all about the burning sensation.

"What is that supposed to mean?" I asked a bit defensively.

"Well, Bella means beautiful in Italian, and you're a beautiful girl," he answered smoothly, not missing a beat.

'_Seriously? Was this guy for real?_' I thought, blushing a little at his words and starting to play with my hair, creating a veil to hide behind instead of answering him. Nobody had ever called me beautiful, besides my Mom, and she was going to be buried in only a matter of minutes.

The rest of the drive over was silent as each of us was caught up in our own thoughts. I was worried and depressed about the fact that I was going to lay my parents to rest in the ground in the next half hour or so and I wasn't exactly looking forward to it.

"You really shouldn't do that, you know," Edward spoke when we were pulling into the cemetery part of the Jacksonville Memory Gardens Funeral Home.

"What are you talking about?" I asked, finally looking back over at him, the first time since we had shaken hands.

He nodded towards my hands. "Cracking your knuckles like that. You really shouldn't do that."

Sure enough, I looked down at my hands and saw that the middle finger on my right hand was in between my thumb and first finger on my left hand and I was about put pressure on the knuckle to crack it.

"Oh," I said lamely, separating them and placing them under my legs to avoid further temptation. "Sorry, I didn't even realize I was doing it. I only do that when I'm really nervous about something."

"What are you so nervous about?" he asked almost immediately staring straight out the window, concentrating on making a particularly sharp turn.

"Isn't it obvious?" I countered, pondering the possibility of him having a mental condition of some sort and Emmett had locked me up in here with him.

"Not necessarily," he answered. "You could be nervous about a whole host of things. It might be this funeral, it could be the school time that you're missing, it could be the prospect of what will happen in the near future, it could be a boy at school, it could be meeting Rosalie for the first time, anything, you see."

I did see. I saw that he was clearly out of his mind.

"Well, I actually wasn't even thinking about half of those things, but now that you mention it, meeting Rosalie is now near the top of my 'Thing to be Nervous About' list, thank you very much."

Edward chuckled and it was the most wonderful sound I had ever heard in my life. I wanted to hear it again and again without seeming like a creeper for wanting to.

"Don't worry about Rosalie," he told me, turning another corner.

"Why shouldn't I worry about her?" I asked, finding myself deeply concentrated on the conversation I was having with Edward, who was practically a stranger. "She looks so mean and stuck up and of course I should be nervous about meeting her. What if she doesn't like me?"

Edward laughed again and I couldn't help but to frown at him.

"Do you think that's funny? That my worries are meant to be funny like that?" I asked him and he sobered up immediately.

"No, I do not think that they are funny, but trust me when I say that you have nothing to worry about when you meet Rosalie. Sure, she can be a bit of a hard ass at times, but she really is an awesome girl. You should have no problems with her at all."

"Yeah, but..." I bit my lip before continuing. "Isn't she supposed to be all protective of Emmett or something and try to steal him away from his family, hating me because I'm the bratty little sister?"

He looked at me like I was completely absurd, and I too was questioning my sanity at that moment.

"Bella, Rosalie has always wanted a little sister, and she'll treat you with the utmost respect simply because you're Emmett's sister," he assured me, coming to a stop and putting my truck into park, turning to face me. "She's only mean towards girls who try and flirt with Emmett and steal his attention away from her, so unless you plan on dating your brother, you've got nothing against you."

"Ew," I replied at the thought of dating Emmett. "Edward, that's just wrong."

He smiled and undid his seatbelt, pulling the keys out of the ignition. I undid my seatbelt and made to open the door, but he placed his right hand over my left one that was resting on the bench beside my leg, effectively stopping me. I felt the same sensation again and decided that I was imagining it or something; he seemed totally unaffected by it.

"Just wait here," he instructed me before getting out of the truck and closing the door behind him, walking towards the bed of my truck.

I was very confused and actually thought that Edward had completely disappeared with my keys, leaving me alone in my truck for something bad to happen, when his face appeared in my window and he opened up my door. I looked at Edward closely as he held out his hand for me to take and I saw in his eyes that he was being very considerate and was genuinely trying to be nice to me. I gave him a small smile and placed my hand in his, noting how small mine looked in contrast to his, and also how that silly thing happened to our hands again as I lightly stepped down and out of the truck. Once I was on solid ground, he didn't let go of my hand like I thought that he would, instead, he locked the door with his free hand and closed it behind me before lacing his fingers with mine and leading me towards the hearses, giving it a small squeeze on the way.

We arrived at the first car that already had the back doors open and I was greeted by Paul, the funeral director's name that I finally remembered, and Lauren. I noticed that Edward sort of lagged behind as they approached me, slowly loosening his grip, and instead of being the confident person that I should have been and pulled him forwards with me, I let go of his hand and took that step. I trusted Edward, even though I had no reason to and had only known him for all of fifteen minutes; maybe that was why Em had trusted him to bring me over here.

"Where is Mr. Swan?" Paul asked, almost in a panic about the fact that Emmett didn't get out of the truck with me.

"Um, he's coming," I replied, concerned with the look on his face at my answer, worried that this man was going to completely lose his head at that little piece of useless information that I have him.

"But I thought that he was with you! I thought that you would be coming together! We're on a bit of a tight schedule, you know, and..."

"He's right behind us," Edward announced and Paul began to calm down, taking comically large breaths.

I started to turn around to see where Emmett was when my ankle rolled over on itself and I started to fall forwards. I closed my eyes and braced myself for the inevitable impact with the ground, but it never came. My eyes flew open and I noticed that there was a pressure around my middle holding me; there was also that same electric shock that coursed through my veins whenever Edward touched me. A quick glance down at my stomach revealed two strong arms that were wrapped around me, slowly pulling me back upright. I turned around to thank my saviour and was even though I already knew who it was, I was still astounded that Edward would catch me like that.

My cheeks turned slightly pink as I noticed the small crowd that was now surrounding us and my eyes flicked over to Paul, who was holding his hand over his heart, like he was going to stop breathing or something. I decided to ignore whatever that feeling I felt with Edward was for the time being and focus on what was happening in the present.

"I... thank you," I said to Edward and felt a different hand on my shoulder.

"Bella, are you okay?" Emmett asked once I turned around.

"Yeah Em, I'm fine," I reassured him, running a hand through my hair as Edward's arms finally fell away from me and I felt him step back.

"Thanks Eddie," Emmett said to Edward, clapping a hand on his shoulder and nodding.

"You're welcome," he replied, gritting his teeth and I got the notion that Emmett said something that he didn't like.

Paul swooped in on Emmett then and began talking to him as they prepared to unload the first casket from the hearse. I felt a presence at my elbow and looked down to see the short little pixie of a girl standing with her arm linked through mine.

"Hi," she whispered. "I'm Alice."

"Bella," I said to her and she smiled, giving my arm a squeeze.

Emmett called Jasper over to the back of the hearse then and Rosalie stepped closer to Alice, who linked her arm through Rosalie's as well. I noticed that Edward was standing off to the side and was watching as the boys prepared to move Renée's casket, running a hand through his hair again. In a bold movement, probably the first one in my life, I released Alice's hold on me and walked over to stand beside him.

"You should go and help them," I told Edward and he immediately shook his head. "Why not?"

"Emmett asked Jasper to help him, not me. I'm not going to barge in there and demand that I have to help," Edward explained, still watching the two of them work.

"Well, I want you to," I said to him placing a hand on his back, pushing him forward a little.

"Why?" he asked me with a frown as he looked down at me as I asked myself the very same question.

"I want you to help because I trust you," I told him, repeating his earlier words to me and I saw a small smile appear on his face.

"Only if you're sure," he said, looking down at me, checking to make sure that this was what I wanted.

I nodded immediately. There was no reason that Edward shouldn't help out, after all he was one of Emmett's friends and I had the feeling that he and I would become acquaintances soon enough anyways. He nodded back and walked forward towards the guys, asking what he could help with. I watched as they worked together to take Renée's casket out and started to carry it up the small hill to the plots. I began my ascent up the hill as well and once I reached the top, I felt someone tap my right shoulder. I turned a little to see who it was and found Rosalie standing there, looking slightly nervous.

"Hi, I'm Rosalie," she introduced herself, reaching her left arm across to cup her right arm, indicating that she was uncomfortable.

"I'm Bella," I replied, holding out my hand to shake hers and she graciously accepted the offer.

"Do you mind if I stand with you?" she asked and I shook my head.

"Not at all."

She gave me a small smile and together we walked over to the plots and watched as they lowered Renée onto the platform on top of the hole. As they boys descended back down to the cars to get Charlie, I felt someone touch the small of my back and Angela came to stand beside me.

"How are you holding up?" she asked me tentatively, trying not to step on any of my figurative toes.

"Not very well," I admitted. "Oh, Angela, this is Rosalie, she's Emmett's girlfriend from Seattle. Rosalie, this is my best friend Angela," I introduced them and they shook hands, but I didn't miss that Rosalie eyed Angela a bit as if she were sizing up the competition. I remembered what Edward had told me about Rosalie's protectiveness over Emmett and spoke up to diffuse a bit of the tension.

"Angela, where's your boyfriend Ben?" I asked her, placing a bit more emphasis on the word boyfriend than needed, but I got my desired effect. Rosalie smiled at Angela, seeing that she was no longer the threat, but Ange looked at me like I had finally cracked.

"He's over standing with a few other guys," she said, nodding over to where Ben was standing with Tyler Crowley and Eric Yorkie, two other boys from our school.

"They had to come, didn't they," I sighed and shook my head, turning around away from the boys.

"Who did?" Rosalie asked, but I shook my head, not answering her as Emmett appeared over the top of the hill, flanked by Jasper and Edward who were carrying Charlie's casket.

A hushed silence fell over everyone as the boys laid Charlie down on a stand over his grave as well and then everyone stepped back into the crowd so that Reverend Weber could commence and say a few words. Emmett came to stand between Rosalie and I, wrapping an arm securely around each of us. Angela's Dad finished rather quickly and Paul stepped forwards towards Emmett and I with the basket of white roses.

We had decided that the white flowers would be placed on top of their caskets before they were lowered down into the ground so that a piece of their family would always be with them. I took mine from the basket before Emmett took his and together we stepped forward and placed the flowers gently down on top of Renée's casket. Once mine was placed on top of the cherry wood, I could feel the fat tears begin to roll down my face and I didn't do a thing to stop them. This was it, the last time that I would ever get to be close to my mother again. I missed her terribly already and wanted nothing else but to feel her gentle hands brush through my hair again, working out all the knots that accumulated after a day at school as I told her what was going on in my life.

I choked, coughing at little and bit my lip to try and stop it from quivering the way that it was as I took the second rose from the basket and made my way over to Charlie's casket. I placed the flower on the top and gave in to my efforts, collapsing on the ground in sobs. I buried my face in my hands as I knelt beside Charlie's casket and felt many different hands touch my shoulder lightly, and I knew that all of them were various members of my family and that they all pitied me. I hated that they pitied me, it was the last thing that I needed right then. I thought of Charlie and all that I missed about him and I hated myself for not going out on that fishing trip he had gone on last weekend. He didn't have anyone to go with as they had all bailed on him, and I refused to go, inadvertently making plans with Angela so I could get out of it. Now I wished more than anything that I could turn back time and go with him. If only I had known.

A different hand grasped my shoulder and I knew right away that it was Emmett's. I looked up at him and saw that he was crying too, so I rubbed my eyes and stood up, immediately being enveloped in his embrace. We backed away from the caskets together and I watched as they were slowly lowered down into the ground. Paul then asked that everyone head back to their cars to head to the small place that he had booked for us, free of charge out of pity for us to greet everyone that had come.

"Bye Mom. Bye Dad," I said to their respective graves quietly. "I'll see you soon enough."

Emmett whispered his goodbyes too and together we walked down the hill to where his friends were waiting for him.

"Okay, we should head on over to then hall now, so that we can get there in time to greet everyone," Emmett said to me trying to be the brave one, even though I knew that he was dying on the inside and I bit my lip.

"You're still not driving," Rosalie told him.

"Whatever you say," he replied submissively, looking directly at her and snaking an arm around her waist.

"Em," I said to him, almost asking a question. "I don't want to go to this party thing," I admitted feeling horrible about telling him that after everything.

"Why not, Bella?" Emmet asked, and I wiped my cheeks from the last remaining tears on it.

"Well, it's just that I don't know a lot of people that will be there and I'm tired and I need a shower and... I just don't want to go and have more people pity me. I've had enough of that to last me a lifetime," Emmett's face was very pensive while I explained this and I felt bad for wanting to bail on him. "It's okay if I stay though; I don't want you to be alone."

"Alright, that's okay, Bells, you don't have to go," he told me and I was surprised, expecting him to pull the guilty card and make me stay with him.

"Really?" I asked in disbelief.

"Yeah. It's the least I can do for you after you had to make all of these arrangements and go through this on your own," he said, pulling out the pity card after all.

"Emmett, that's not why. I'll go, I will. Forget that I said anything in the first place," I told him, walking over to the truck and leaning my back up against it, holding my head in my hands.

Footsteps came closer to me and I could tell by the heavy pattern that it was Emmett again. Wordlessly, he stopped in front of me, placed his hands on top of mine and took them down away from my head.

"You don't have to come if you don't want to," he said gently for his normally loud voice. "I'll deal."

"I don't want to abandon you either, Em. I just... I don't know if I can after everything..." I tried to make him see but I knew that I wasn't making much sense. "I'll stay if you want me to. Just tell me what you want."

"I want you to go home and get some rest. I will take over and go to the hall and greet everyone, I'm sure that they will understand when you don't make an appearance; you've done enough for me, Bells."

"But, I don't want you to be all alone at that thing either," I half-protested, not wanting to go at all.

"Rosalie can come with me and we'll cover for you. Just get in the truck and I'll get someone to take you over to the house, okay?" I nodded and hugged him in thanks. He cleared his throat and ruffled my hair before I let go and turned around to open the door of the truck; apparently we hadn't locked the door but if anyone wanted to steal it, more power to them. I sat inside with my eyes closed, waiting for someone to come down to drive me home so that this hell of a day could finally end.

**A/N: If you're still out there, I would appreciate a review... even if it's to tell me that I suck for not updating either story.**


	7. American Boy

**Hey, if you're still out there feel free to leave a review! I have a couple more chapters written so I'm going to try and update as regularly as possible (more than once a year!)**

**Thanks to basoom, ASHLEYYYBLACKBERRYYY, hanaharoo and GenesisCM for your reviews!**

**Disclaimer: I do not own Twilight or any of its characters; they belong to the lovely Stephenie Meyer. I do however, own the plot.**

**Edward POV**

I really hated seeing Emmett and his sister so broken like this, I literally wanted to pick them both up and mend them to take away the pain that they were clearly in. No one could deny it after Bella completely fell apart when she was putting the flower on top of her Dad's casket. It pained me to see her like that, but I had only known her for a short amount of time; it was probably just the fact that there was nothing that I could do to help her or Emmett for that matter. Without knowing much about their parents, I was just another face in the crowd to her; another of the well wishers that she probably wished would just go away already.

I could tell that she was a wonderful girl and I wanted to get to know her better and become her friend; she had me entranced and I wanted to learn more but I would have to be careful around her. No sudden movements, so to speak.

After we all watched Bella walked carefully down the hill and lean against the passenger side of the truck to wait, Emmett spoke, breaking the silence.

"I need one or two of you to go back to the house and stay with Bella," he began talking immediately, his voice sounding hollow. "I know I told her that someone would just take her over, but..." he stopped and sighed, running a hand through his hair.

"I'll do it," I volunteered.

"I'll go with him," Alice piped up and I nodded.

"Jasper and I will go with you Emmett," Rose told him and Jasper nodded silently.

"It's settled then," I concluded and Alice and I turned to begin walking towards the truck.

"Edward? Alice?" Emmett called out to us and I stopped to turn and look at him. "I need you to keep a close eye on Bella. I... when we were up there she told Mom and Dad that she would see them really soon and I can't bear it if she..."

"She won't," Alice replied confidently, tapping the side of her head. "It's my intuition; she won't do what you're thinking."

I pretended to know what was going on after we said our goodbyes, shaking Emmett's hand and nodding at the look he gave me, Alice and I started walking towards the truck once again. Emmett clearly wanted me to look out for Bella but I didn't know what I was looking for. I shoved my hands in my jacked pockets and kicked a stone down the hill, watching it roll ahead of us.

"Bella won't do what?" I asked Alice quietly as we neared the bottom of the hill, taking her hand to help her down the last part of the steep slope.

"She won't commit suicide," she replied simply, leaping to the pavement.

"Alice wait," I said, yanking her hand back so she faltered with her next step forwards. "Do you mean to tell me that we're on suicide watch now?"

"No, where the hell have you been? She won't do it; now come on before she gets suspicious," Alice removed her hand from mine and literally skipped the rest of the way over to Bella.

I shook my head, following her over and unlocked my side of the truck and getting in before reaching across to unlock the passenger side, letting the girls in. Bella climbed in first and got the middle seat and Alice got the last seat, which I didn't exactly see how it worked, seeing as how Alice was the shortest one and all, but I didn't push it; instead putting on my seatbelt and starting the truck.

Her spot in the middle was probably a good thing though, then I could keep my eye on her; I would not let Emmett down in my new post. I intended on watching Bella like a hawk until he returned to take over for me. I didn't sign up for babysitting when I came down here, but I would gladly do it to keep Emmett in my good books. No one wanted to be on his bad side.

I couldn't help but to laugh though when I noticed that Alice jumped as it roared to life and saw Bella crack a small smile too.

"It's loud, what can I say?" Alice defended herself, crossing her arms over her chest. "I wasn't expecting it to be nearly so loud. I'm used to luxury sports cars from the 21st century, not this kind of... antique vintage," she said generously.

Personally I would have used the words 'piece of crap', but I wasn't going to diss Bella's truck on a day like this with everything going on and all, and also considering that I had just met her. Normally I wouldn't care so much of what a girl thought, but I decided to cut Bella some slack.

"I love this truck," Bella replied, running her hand over the dashboard and I took that opportunity to glare at Alice while Bella wasn't watching.

"It's lovely," I responded, struggling to shift it into drive and pulled away from the curb as gently as I could; it certainly didn't handle like a sports car.

It was oddly quiet in the cab as I drove and I looked over at Alice to see if she was alive or something as it wasn't like her to let the silence linger like this. I saw that she was indeed sitting silently, but I also saw that Bella had her head resting on Alice's shoulder. Alice's small arms were around Bella and Bella's shoulders were shaking and I knew that she was crying again. I felt horrible for her and also felt the need to try and reach out for this girl that I barely knew; acting on impulse, I took my right hand off the wheel and took the hand that was closest to me in mine. It felt so small and warm in mine and I couldn't help but to give her hand a small squeeze. To my surprise, Bella returned the gesture and gently put pressure on my hand causing me to smile a little bit.

I looked over Bella's head at Alice and noticed that she was already looking at me. She smiled at me a tiny bit, a smile that seemed forced under these circumstances. I stopped at a red light and Bella sat up, releasing my hand and rubbing her eyes.

"Bella, are you okay?" Alice asked softly and Bella nodded.

"Yeah," she replied but I didn't think that Alice believed her, judging by the fleeting look that crossed her face. I didn't think that Bella even noticed though. "You need to turn at the next light," she addressed me and I nodded, only realizing then that I didn't know where exactly I was driving.

I followed her lead and turned at the next light and noticed that we were leaving the business sector of Jacksonville and more into residential neighbourhoods.

"Talk to me," Bella demanded and I turned quickly to look at her at the same time that Alice did.

"Pardon?" Alice asked and I turned my attention back to the road. Alice could take one for the team here; I didn't know what to say to her.

"Talk to me about something, anything. I want to try and get my mind off of today," she clarified, looking straight ahead out of the windshield.

My heart dropped at her little request. I couldn't imagine having to ever go through what she had gone through since the accident, but I wondered why she would want to try and forget about it right away. I wanted more than ever to be able to read minds at that moment just to see what exactly was going on in her head.

"Alright, well. Is it always sunny here or something? In sunny Jacksonville? Isn't that what they call it?" Alice started asking questions and I was seriously questioning her sanity as well; which was something I normally did with my sister though. Case in point the cooling of her hair in the car at the airport and everything; she really was crazy.

Thankfully Bella laughed and told me where to turn next before answering her.

"Well, it is awfully sunny here," she began, looking fondly out the window at the landscape. "But I like it. I'm not too fond of the rain, but I guess that comes with living here all my life."

"That's so incredible," Alice commented. "I bet that I could get the best tan down here."

I snorted and Alice shot me one of her practically patented glares. I shrugged and tried to think of something to say to Bella, looking out the windshield as we passed a sign that read _Jacksonville Beach._ I figured that she must live closer to the beach than the actual city center judging by the area we were entering.

"So, how long have you had this truck for?" I asked politely.

"Since I got my licence," she replied. "I found it in a scrap yard out of the city and my Dad bought it for me. Mom wasn't too crazy about the idea, but once we got a few things fixed on it, she eventually came around."

"Don't you want to upgrade to a new car?" Alice asked. "I mean, surely you could afford a new truck; one that has leather seats and GPS and satellite radio and all sorts of new amenities."

"I know," she said softly. "But I like this truck, it has character and I'm not getting rid of it until it croaks. Do you guys have a car?"

"I sure do!" Alice replied, practically bouncing in her seat with excitement just talking about her precious car. "It's yellow with a black leather interior and goes really fast and I love it. Edward actually bought it for me," she added and I groaned.

"Only half of it," I countered so that Bella wouldn't be uncomfortable with the amount of money that I spent on Alice, at the same cursing her for letting that little bit of information slip. She always announced that, but I didn't exactly feel comfortable with people, other than my family and close friends knowing exactly how much money I possessed. Even then, I kept that number very small; I could count the number of people who were aware on four fingers and even then they probably only knew ballpark figures.

"Sounds nice," she commented. "What kind of car is it?"

"A Porsche," Alice replied almost lovingly and Bella whipped her head around so fast that I was afraid that she was going to give herself whip lash.

"You bought her half a Porsche? Are you crazy or something? What kind of college guy has _that_ much money just sitting around?"

"I... well, we have a bit of money," I said, not really answering her question and running a hand through my hair.

"Unbelievable. What kind of car do you drive then, Mr. High Roller?" She asked me, almost angrily.

"I... it's just... just a Volvo," I replied, not bothering to tell her about my special occasion car while trying to recover from her sudden turn in emotions, but my answer, regardless of its simplicity and truthfulness, just seemed to make her angrier at me.

"My house is the second on the right," she told me harshly and I nodded, pulling into the driveway and parking the truck.

"My keys," she said to me, holding out her hand for them and I dropped the keys into her palm while Alice jumped out, leaving room for Bella to get out.

Bella stormed up the front walk way and unlocked the door, leaving it open as she entered. I slowly got out of the truck and walked around the front of it to stand with Alice who was looking at the house.

"It's...cute," she supplied as I looked up at it.

It was definitely very small, and I didn't see how the four of them could live comfortably in there. The house was two stories with a small front porch and the exterior was made of white panelling that had yellowed with age. There was a tiny garage detached from the house but with the same siding all over it.

"We should go inside," I suggested, starting to head towards the open door. "I don't feel comfortable with her in there all alone."

"Do you like her?" Alice asked bluntly as we were climbing the porch steps and I started choking on my spit.

"What?" I asked her incredulously as we stepped over the threshold.

"Do you? I know that you heard me," she repeated, taking off her heels and placing them neatly beside the door.

"I... she's a nice girl," I answered, closing the door and toeing my shoes off.

"That's not what I asked."

I sighed. "Well, she is a nice girl, but Ali she's two years younger than me. And besides, I have Tanya back at home."

"But you're not even with her," she argued with me, crossing her tiny arms. "You haven't grown the balls to ask her out or anything. For all we know she could have moved on by now. But Bella, she's something special."

"She's nice," I repeated, taking out my phone and checking it. Four missed calls and a text; I really needed to pay more attention.

"What are you doing?" Alice whispered kind of angrily which sort of pissed me off. What the hell did my sister care what I was doing with girls, as long as I stayed away from her friends; that was always our rule, but then again she went and broke it after the first time she met my roommate Jasper.

"I'm calling Tanya," I told her decisively, scrolling through my contacts until her name appeared.

Alice rolled her eyes and went to sit down on the couch in the next room.

"Take that, Ali," I muttered, pressing the call button.

I shook my head and made my way out to the backyard, which wasn't hard to find, seeing as how I could literally spit from the front door to the back door, and held the phone up to my ear as Tanya answered.

After I wrapped up my conversation with her I re-entered the house, removed my shoes and made my way back towards the small living room that I had spotted near the front door. I found Alice sitting on the couch in there with Bella's head resting on her shoulder. I frowned and Alice rolled her eyes; I just didn't know when the two of them had become so close but I figured that Ali had probably adopted her as her new kid sister or something. Alice had a way of attracting people to her, that gene seemed to skip me.

"You okay Bella?" I asked and if looks could kill then I'd be dead a hundred times over. Alice looked like she was going to murder me as Bella sighed.

"Of course not," Bella said defensively. "Why would I be? I've been through more pain than you're probably ever been through in your whole entire life, Edward. I don't know why you're here pretending to care about this; why don't you go back to your perfect little world where you buy each other Porsches and then everything will go back to normal. You know nothing about me."

To say that I was shocked would be an understatement. I didn't know if I'd ever been told off by a woman beside my sister and my mother and I was literally frozen to the spot that I was standing in. Clearly the Alice's car was a weak point for her and I regretted bringing it up in the first place; even if it was Alice who dropped that bomb on her. For that matter, Bella seemed to have no quell with the _owner_ of that stupid car, just me.

I was so glad when I heard the slam of car doors and Emmett`s heavy footsteps coming up the walk followed by the click of Rosalie`s shoes. Maybe he would know how to fix this.

**Emmett POV**

The gathering as I referred to it; was long and boring. I was so glad that Rosalie and Jasper came to the funeral today so that they could come to this stupid pity party with me, especially after Bella bailed and went back to the house; though I knew that Bells would have come with me if it was just the two of us. I still wondered though how exactly the others had gotten down to us, as I hadn't heard and didn't know they were coming, but I figured that I'd weasel it out of one of them sometime. Eventually after loads of condolences, kisses and tears, the guests finally began to leave until it was just the three of us left in the hall along with Paul and Lauren.

"Just have a seat and I'll go talk to Paul and then we'll be out of here, okay?" I told Jazz and Rose, pointing to a couple chairs, but Rosalie just shook her head, always the defiant one, which was pretty much the last thing I needed even though it was nice to have her around.

"We'll come with you," she pretty much demanded, as Jasper shrugged his shoulders and sat down in the chair. Smart kid.

I walked over to Paul and he shook my hand, looking very sad, and I'm pretty sure it was for me. That guy had the sad look down to an art; part of being in the business of death, I supposed.

"Now that the day is over, we've got to decide what you are going to do with all these flowers," he spoke softly and I looked around for the first time and saw that there were massive amounts of flowers all over the room. No way I was taking these stupid things home, we'd be lucky to fit even one bouquet in our tiny little house let alone the lot of them.

"Umm, well..." I actually had no idea what to do with them and I ran a hand through my hair so done with thinking for the day.

"Well, you could take some home with you, and give them away to other people," Rosalie suggested and I nodded.

"Yeah, that's a good idea," I said, since it's the only idea that we had going for us. "Why don't you go and pick out the ones that you like and take them out to your car. Not too many, you haven't seen the size of our house. Get Jasper to help you."

Rosalie smiled, patting my shoulder and walked over to look at the flowers and calling Jasper over once she'd chosen a couple to take with us.

"What are you going to do with the rest of them?" Paul asked and I thought for a minute. Rose said to give them away, but to who?

"Take them to the ER and ICU wards at the hospital," I told him as that was the first thing that came to my mind.

"Are you sure?"

"I'm positive. They helped Mom and Dad as best they could and I want to thank them in one of the best ways that I can think of right now. Let's do that; send it to them." I really didn't care where the damned flowers went; they could end up in the dumpster, but at least I sounded like I cared about them.

Paul nodded and walked away, leaving me alone with Lauren, who I had been trying to avoid the entire day. I looked in Rosalie's direction and she smiled over at me, pointing out something to Jasper. An annoying noise coming from the girl in front of me made me look away.

"So Emmett," she drawled out my name, making it longer than it should be. "How are you holding up today?"

I frowned at her and looked away, trying to forget that she even was talking to me. I turned around to start walking away when I felt a hand on my left bicep and looked down to see her long, orange hands with gross pink, fake nails on the ends of them. Why a girl would feel the need to fake and bake in _Florida _of all places was beyond me. Girls were weird. She gave my arm a squeeze and I couldn't help but to stop and turn around.

"Look, Lauren, I don't know what you're trying to pull, but I have a girlfriend and..."

"Well she's not in the room right now, is she?" she said, trying to be seductive and pushing her breasts out closer to me.

"Lauren, it would be best if you just stepped away right now," I said to her in a low and menacing tone, but to my disgust she just giggled and came closer towards me, holding her hands out. She was disgusting and I was tired of all the crap from the day, the last thing I needed was her attempt at coming on to me.

Instinctively, I put my hands up to stop her from invading my personal bubble, once again she took it the wrong way and grabbed them, trying to lace her fingers through mine but I was faster and held my fingers together.

"Lauren," I growled and she smiled up at me.

"That's what I want to hear you grunt baby," she licked her lips, raising her eyebrows.

"Step away," I ordered her as nice as possible, stepping back away from her but she kept on coming towards me.

"What is going on?" Rosalie's voice echoed through the hall and I looked at her, throwing her a desperate look. This chick seriously couldn't take a hint and I'd be damned if Rose was mad at me after all that.

I could see that she was glaring at me and that Jasper was standing slightly behind her with his mouth agape. Rosalie began to walk towards us with a determined expression on her face and I felt threatened. I took this opportunity to disentangle my hands from Lauren's and when she made a move towards me, I shook my head and crossed my arms in front of my chest.

"What do you think you are doing?" Rose spat at Lauren and the two of them started a glaring contest.

"Just taking a look at the goods," Lauren replied shrilly and I choked a little at the notion.

"Well you know what? He is _my_ boyfriend and you have no reason to lay your filthy, orange little hands on him," Rose hissed and Lauren laughed.

"You weren't in the room. And besides, he deserves someone much better than you; something more than a worthless little free-loading blonde bi—"

Before Lauren had finished her sentence, Rosalie had stepped forward and slapped her across the face. She did it so fast that I barely had time to stop her and instead ended up grabbing Rose around the waist and pulling her away, kicking and screaming before she could inflict any more damage on the girl. I pulled her swiftly from the room outside the front doors and opened up the passenger door of the car that they had brought around, sitting her inside and giving her explicit orders to stay there. I left her fuming in the car to run back inside for Jasper and whatever else we needed.

"That it?" I asked as I nearly bumped into Jasper who was on the way out and he nodded at me.

"Unless you're interested in that, of course," Jasper said with a glint to his eye but I just rolled mine at him turning right back around. Stupid kid.

"I didn't think she was going to launch herself at Lauren back there," he commented, walking with me back to the car, taking large strides to keep up.

"I know man," I said.

"But the things she was saying about my sister were..."

"I was there, I don't need reminding," I interrupted him as we went outside and I noticed that Rosalie wasn't in the car any more.

"Where could she have gone?" I grumbled, scanning around until Jasper pointed her out talking to Paul.

Jasper climbed in the back seat of the car and I leaned against the side of it, waiting for her to come back over, knowing that there was no use in going over to her and trying to either peel her away or help her; she'd only get really defensive and angry. I'd learned that through experience. After a few minutes, I heard the click of her heels against the pavement, but didn't look up as she came closer to me. She stopped and I could see the tips of her shoes in my line of vision, but I still didn't look up.

"Emmett?" she asked me softly, but I didn't break my resolve and look up at her. I felt disgusted by the way that Lauren had basically thrown herself at me and I didn't know how Rose was going to react to the fact that I had let her come that close to me. She sighed and tried again.

"Emmie? Come on baby, what's wrong?"

"You know that I had nothing to do with her, right?" I asked, still not looking at her and I felt one of her small fingers under my chin, lifting it up. I didn't fight it and allowed my face to tilt upright and my eyes followed, looking right into her impossibly blue ones.

"Emmett, I know. I know you, and I know that you would never do that to me. There are just some people in this world like her who are ridiculous and don't know how to take no for an answer, and unfortunately for some of those people, they meet girls like me and get the backhand that they deserve."

I sighed, taking her right hand in mine and kissed it.

"Are you okay?" I asked her and she nodded. "I don't mean your hands, I mean are _you_ okay?"

Rosalie nodded. "I'm okay; my hand is good. I mean, she said some things about me and I can't help but to think about them and..." she paused and I tucked a piece of hair behind her ear. "And she's right, you know. You... you do deserve someone better than me and..."

I stopped her train of thought right away by pressing a finger to her lips.

"Stop it, Rosalie. She was just trying to say something to get you all riled up and it worked. None of what she said was true though, none of it, I can promise you that. If anything, I don't deserve someone as beautiful, wonderful, loving and caring as you." As much as Rose was a firecracker on the outside, I knew that she had a couple insecurities on the inside that only I knew about and I made it my personal mission to stop those fears of hers.

"Emmett," she said in a lazy warning tone, but I just smiled and leaned in to kiss her.

"But... it's not..."

"Shh," I told her, capturing her lips in mine again, effectively silencing her.

I heard a knocking noise from behind us and I reluctantly pulled my face away from Rosalie's and she started to giggle. I took her hand and opened the door for her to climb in and by the time I got around to the driver's side and got in she was finished yelling at Jasper for interrupting. She then turned to me, starting to rail on me about driving in my 'condition' but I assured her that I was fine and that I had my emotions in check.

The drive back to my house was silent; Rosalie just sat there looking out the window while holding my hand and Jasper was fuming in the backseat, still unhappy about getting yelled at by Rose. We pulled into the drive way and carried the flowers up the front steps when the door was flung open by Edward.

"Where's the fire?" I asked him jokingly and he just shook his head at me.

"Can I talk to you?" he asked, glancing nervously into the living room while we put the flowers down on the floor.

"Uh, yeah sure," I replied and Edward began leading me towards the back yard. When we passed by the living room, I saw Bella curled up on the couch, being held tight by Alice.

"Edward, what's wrong?" I asked him once I shut the back door and he turned around to face me.

"I... Bella's mad at me," he said while running a hand through his hair.

"Is there a reason for her to be mad at you?" I asked him, suspicious as to why he would be so concerned when he was currently involved with chasing that Tanya Denali chick around campus.

"I don't know. We were all in the truck, talking about our cars and Alice sort of let it slip that I paid for half of her Porsche and Bella went like ballistic," he explained, sitting down on the small deck that we had out there.

"It's not your fault," I told him. "She's a bit touchy about the subject of money. I guess it's pretty clear that we don't have much," I chuckled nervously, gesturing towards our small house. "Living on just a Sherriff's salary doesn't go very far."

"But you go to college; one that's nowhere near your home," Edward pointed out, resting his chin on his hand.

"Yeah, I do but it was a partial scholarship and was only for two years. My family knew that and they've all been saving every last penny, Bella included, to help me out. So to her, spending however much on a Porsche would seem like a waste of money to her. She's a very practical person in that sort of way. She'd rather have nothing and be living off the streets and be surrounded by family than have a lot of money and material things and be alone. That's just the way she is," I finished, shrugging.

"I guess that makes sense," Edward said, nodding his head. "I should go apologize." He stood up and turned to go back inside, but his phone began ringing.

"_Take me on a trip I'd like to go somewhere,"_

"OoO! Who's calling youuu!" I called out, trying to snatch the phone from him, but he was faster. "Is it your girrrlfriendd?"

"_I really want to come back here with you,"_

"Yes Emmett, it is," he replied and I stood there, gaping at him.

"_You be my American boy,"_

"Since when?" I asked; the last time I checked he`d sworn off of girls claiming he didn`t ever know what to do around them.

"Since like ten minutes ago," he explained and I shook my head. ```Don`t tell Alice.``

``I won`t,`` I told him, absolutely dumbfounded at his turn of events.

"_American boyy,"_

"Hey Tanya," I heard him say, answering the phone as I went back inside shaking my head.

I couldn't believe that he would actually ask out that stupid slut from school; everyone knew that she was all up inside everyone, but Edward seemed to be too dumb to notice. Either that or she had played him well as he'd clearly 'fallen' for her, no matter how many times we had all told him to stay away. Some people just never learned.


End file.
